


Keidge Month 2k18

by Some_Cookie_Crumbz



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-18
Updated: 2018-03-31
Packaged: 2019-04-03 21:52:03
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 31
Words: 79,137
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14005581
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Some_Cookie_Crumbz/pseuds/Some_Cookie_Crumbz
Summary: Collection of all my fills for the Prompts for Keidge Month 2018. All have been cross-posted from my tumblr account. Some chapters will be NSFW, but will be listed as such in the Index and Summary.





	1. Tutoring

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lance may not remember or appreciate having a bonding moment with their mulleted teammate, but Pidge will take any chance to further her knowledge and offer some of her own up as well.

“Your technique is kinda… sloppy,” He hadn’t meant anything by the comment, but apparently he’d struck a nerve. There was a low exhale of air through her teeth as she turned off and set down the soldering iron she’d been using and reached up slowly to tug her goggles down. He had been settled on the other end of her work table, sharpening the blade of his knife, chatting casually with her about random things when the thought occurred to him. He hadn’t seen a point in keeping it to himself, as he learned she wasn’t typically offended by him blurting out his random thoughts.

Except maybe this time, judging by the skeptical gleam flashing in her amber eyes.

“Hey, if you think you could do a better job, be my guest,” She scoffed, offering his the soldering iron and indicating the pieces of the bayard settled on her workspace.

He blinked then held up his hand. “Ah, no, I meant your  _fighting_  technique. I think the only people on board with any rights to say anything about how you do anything in regards to building and programming would be Hunk or Coran,” He said with a small laugh.

“Ah! Well, I guess you aren’t exactly  _wrong_ … I’ve never had any  _real_  fighting classes before so I just kinda go on what seems like a logical approach. The closest I’ve had was some ballet classes when I was little and thought it’d be kinda cool to know how to dance, but I don’t really think those count,” She agreed with a small shrug, tugging her goggles back up and resuming her work.

“Well, the dance classes can actually be helpful to learning how to fight,” He said calmly, leaning over a bit to watch her work as well as be heard a little better. The soldering iron itself wasn’t particularly loud, but he had learned that she could get a bit lost in her own head when she worked. “I mean, dance tends to teach you fluid movement of the body and how to maintain a sense of balance, from what I understand.  Having a good grasp on those concepts can be monumental in laying the groundwork to becoming a formidable fighter.”

“Really? Huh, I guess that makes sense. Watching you and Shiro and Allura sometimes feels more like watching dancers than trained fighters,” She mused thoughtfully, shutting off the soldering iron and setting it aside. She leaned back in her chair to examine her work and then, satisfied that the two pieces of Lance’s bayard had been successfully morphed back together, looked up at him with a small smile. “I shouldn’t be surprised to be a novice compared to the three of you; all of you have formal training and years worth of experience, after all.”

“I could show you a couple tricks, if you want. Specifically since you’re typically going up against bigger opponents, and that can cause a lot of issues for someone without a lot of practice or knowledge,” He offered.

She pushed up from her desk and shrugged. “Sure, that could be fun. I’ll go get changed into some workout stuff real fast and then meet you in the training room, mkay?”

“Sounds good. I’ll meet you there,” He said with a wave, pushing off of her desk and heading off. He stopped by his own room briefly to drop off his jacket and then went to set up the training room. He got the gladiator ready, making sure to put it on its low-level instruction mode. In that mode, it could be controlled via a small headband that translated mental impulses. It was a good way for them to train with each other without running the risk of hurting each other, given their motions were imitated through an unfeeling robot while also giving the other an opponent to practice their moves on. He tested a few moves with the headband on, making sure the robot was in top shape, and grinned as Pidge entered the room.

“Oh, dang, brought out the gladiator just for little old me? I feel so flattered,” She teased lightly, setting two water bottles she’d brought with her up against the wall. She then approached a little closer and began stretching. “So where should we get started?”

“Right now, I just want to show you the basics of dealing with a taller, bigger opponent when they’ve got you in close corners. For the most part, you already understand that, being smaller, you can duck and evade to keep an upper hand; after all, you’ve done that before,” He pointed out calmly, taking a few steps forward. The gladiator imitated the actions. He stopped once it was particularly close in with her. “Now, being in close quarters can actually work out quite well for you. It makes it easier for you to get good body hits in while being positioned to take a few less hits, but you need to be careful and make sure to stay alert. Most opponents will expect you to get in close when they have a height or size advantage, so make sure to rely more on your ability to duck and dodge.”

“Makes sense,” She agreed, curling her arms inwards a bit and starting to bounce a bit from side to side. He grinned at her enthusiasm.

“Also, make sure to keep your chin and head protected. Those can be huge trouble spots if you get injured,” He explained before he shifted his own position in preparation of beginning.

“Got it, boss. Now let’s see you put your money where your mouth is,” She beamed, playfully jabbing at the robot.

He had always known that Pidge was a clever girl and, despite her lack of training, was a decent fighter. He’d seen her figure out ways through problems at the drop of a hat, skating by on the edge of her seat and still getting out on top. With a bit of teaching and training, he knew she could become an even greater force to be reckoned with, and that idea had made him smirk. He had learned over all his time getting to know her that Pidge was a lot like a small firecracker; tiny but packed a serious punch. Giving her even more ammunition to cause an even larger explosion? Well, that was just him making sure that the Galra got what they deserved for everything they’d done over their tyrannical reign.

What he hadn’t anticipated was how quickly Pidge caught on to what he wanted to show her.

Within just the first twenty minutes, she had already managed to pick up on all his tips, implementing them against the gladiator. He had always known that Pidge was a quick study – had seen her learn how to dismantle and reassemble Altean and Galra tech with a mere wave of her hands, sometimes even boosting the output of said devices – but he still found himself impressed. He ended up ditching the headband, placing the gladiator into standby mode, and looked at her with a small smirk. “Want me to teach you a few actual moves?” He offered.

She straightened up and smirked back. “You think I’m good enough for all that?” She asked.

He shrugged and moved to stand beside her. “I guess we’ll find out, now, won’t we?” He answered. He started out with more defensive moves – sweeping kicks, good blocking stances and the like – simply because going on the defensive was always a good way to start when placed at a disadvantage. She picked up on those quickly enough, to, and after another thirty minutes of that they took a break.

She tossed him one of the water bottles before twisting open the top of her own and taking a long chug. When she finished, she wiped her mouth with the back of her hand and watched him for a moment. “I can teach you some tips and tricks too, if you want,” She offered.

He perked up a bit in surprise. “What?”

She shrugged and took a small sip of her water. “Well, I figure it’d be a fair trade, yeah? You help me get better with fighting and I help you get better at some of the more covert stuff. Knowing how to hack in to stuff could be really helpful if you were ever captured or anything,”

“Are you implying that I’d be stupid enough to get captured in the first place?” He raised an eyebrow as he thought over her suggestion.

She laughed at him. “ _Stupid_  enough to get captured? Not necessarily.  _Stubborn and impulsive_  enough to run into a Galra trap where you  _could_  be overpowered and taken hostage? That, I believe, would be more inline with your pattern of behavior,” She chuckled. She then pointed her water bottle at him as he opened his mouth to speak again. “And before you argue with me on that, I’d just like to remind you that I had to go save your sorry tail for running off by himself and picking a fight with a Galran druid. And shortly after that incident tried to take Zarkon out by himself with the Red Lion.”

“…”

“Do you think I just pull my thesis statements out of my ass or something? I’m a scientist; research and observing patterns is kind of part of what that entails,”

He scowled a bit and grumbled under his breath before chugging from his water bottle, choosing to ignore her laughter behind him. Admittedly, though, she did have a point. “So you can teach me how to hack into door guards?” He asked.

Her grin turned mischievous. “Oh, I can teach you more than just that. But we need to start small, first. Let’s see if we can teach you how to hack the door locks around here, first. I’m sure Lance wouldn’t mind being our guinea pig,” She mused happily.

He laughed, too, as she explained how pulling pranks on Lance would make him a better, more formidable Paladin.


	2. Competition

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Divergent of Canon story about how Keith just really misses his robotic space cat, Lance is a less-than-responsible space pet owner, and Pidge is the voice of reason and comfort.

Lance had gotten them into quite the predicament, to say the least.

They still weren’t exactly sure what he had done to get Red Lion hijacked by a bunch of space pirates to most likely be sold off to the highest Pro-Zarkon bidder but his lack of due diligence probably had something to do with it. They had been on a planet called Harrunte, a planet littered in resorts and hotels and fancy alien restaurants for a much needed reprieve from the constant battling they did. It had been Coran’s idea and insistence that they take a few days off and, while hesitant at first,Shiro had agreed. Back to the issue of the cat-napped mechanical beast, Pidge knew that it had something to do with the cute alien girl the other Paladin had been flirting with at the resort they’d all been staying at. The young alien had seemed like she was trying to keep an eye on all the Paladins as she chatted with Lance; and not just because her hair-tendrils all possessed little eyeballs at the end, either. While Allura and Coran had read Lance the riot act, she sent word of the situation to Hunk and Shiro, whom had gone out to get space-shaved ice.

She had also sent a message to Keith about the situation, as he’d been on his way to join up with the team.

“How the  _Hell_  did you let this happen?” Keith had all but roared, seizing Lance up by the lapels of his Hawaiian-print vacation shirt and getting up in his face.

The other nearly snarled, grabbing and shoving Keith’s hands off of him. “It’s not  _my_ fault, okay? They had it all planned out!”

“Yeah, because you’re always thinking with the  _wrong head_!” He barked back, a flush of rage starting to creep up along his cheeks and the tips of his ears.

Hunk let out a gasped, “ _Oh_ ,” while covering his mouth with one hand. Pidge had to bite the inside of her cheek from laughing.

“Come on, you two, that’s enough,” Shiro said, his tone strict but the effect a little dampened. It was hard to take him serious in his big, floppy straw hat. “Look, we know where this race if being set up, right?”

“We should be able to track Red Lion easily enough once we get back to the Castle,” Allura agreed gently, carefully removing the sunglasses perched on her nose.

“Good. Let’s go, track her down, and bring her back,” Keith grumbled angrily.

“Excuse me, but if  _anyone_  is gonna bring Red Lion back, it’s gonna be  _me_!  _I’m_  her Paladin, after all,” Lance sneered with a small growl, turning on his heel and storming off towards where they’d parked the Castle. Hunk was close on his heels, shouting at him to wait up. Pidge watched Keith for a moment, his fists clenching tightly not going missed by her as they all shuffled along.

————————————————————————————–

They ended up at an underground racing circuit, the seedy place overflowing with a mix of allied and non-allied forces.

As it turned out, Red Lion was being offered as the prize to the first place winner in the next race scheduled to go down. They managed to get that information out of an alien Keith seemed to recognize – something about a knife booth in the mall – and started looking into the sign-up. The female alien that Lance had been flirting with was standing their, chatting eagerly with an older looking alien manning the booth. Her associate reminded Pidge of a puffer fish with its wide-apart eyes and thin spikes all along its head. “Hey!” Lance shouted angrily, pointing a finger accusingly at them both.

The female jerked to attention at his voice and tried to take off running. She was easily stopped by Allura, hooking her with her whip and jerking her back to them so fast and hard, Pidge was certain the princess had actually hurt the offender in her detainment, impressed and a bit intimidated. “That seems a bit rude of you, don’t you think? Running off when a friend pops by to say hello?” Allura lectured calmly, keeping her wrapped in her whip but spinning her around to face Lance.

The alien flashed a nervous smile at the scowling young human. “Lance,” She crooned softly. She had an accent of some kind, though, so it sounded more like “Lunce”.

“Dawula,” He growled lowly, tone hedged and angry, “I want my Lion back.”

“I am afraid that I cannot do. It is in my hands no longer; only the victor may have claim to the Lion of Red,” Dawula said nervously, her tendrils looking about the area frantically, fearful of something. Allura tightened her hold on the other, glaring from Dawula to looking at the others.

“Then we’ll  _all_  just enter the race to get Red back!” Keith growled lowly, hands twitching like he wanted to do something – anything – to let out some of his pent-up frustrations.

“Not as easy as you say it to be, dear child,” Tutted the other alien Dawula had been talking to. They were wearing a large grin as they gently played with some shining silver coins in their pincher-esque hands. “For such an event we have rules and many reasons for them to be followed.”

He growled lowly, pushing one hand through his hair, before advancing on the booth in slow strides. If the alien was intimidated he didn’t let it show. “And what  _are_ these rules?” He growled out.

“Glad for you to ask! Forty-eight hours allowed for preparation for race. New ship must be built to be used in race only. There is a place for parts close by to here for use by any competitors. Two pilots must be necessary in the running of it; no only one pilot or no entry can be allowed. Weapons and sabotage are a yes but killing is not of the allowed approaches to success. You should desire to enter, yes?” He mused, reaching behind him to produce a small clipboard with what was most likely a writing instrument attached. It looked a lot like a piece of celery, only dark blue with a luminous pink tip. He offered it toward them, grin widening to become something a bit more malicious.

Keith swiped it from his hand and turned to look at the others, taking another chance to shoot another glare at Lance. “Okay, so using the Lion’s or Blade fighters are out of the question,” He grumbled. Shiro nodded his head and moved the team a decent space away from the booth, the six of them crowding together so they couldn’t be overheard.

“Well, we still have six eligible participants, so that means that we’ve got three teams that can sign up,” Pidge pointed out. Then, her grin a bit boastful, she indicated all of them with a wave of her hand. “On top of that, everyone on the team has experience with the mechanics of building or repairing ships as well as piloting. There’s no way that, between the three of us, one team wouldn’t be able to win this thing.”

“You do have a point,” Allura said.

Shiro hummed and nodded, setting his hands on his hips. “As far as teams go, here’s what I’m thinking will work best for us; Allura and Hunk, Keith and Pidge, Lance and I. The fact is that we need to play to each other’s strengths and weaknesses if we want to be successful,” He explained. He then took the clipboard from Keith and jotted down his name and handed it to Lance next. “My plan is that we need to determine one team to maintain the lead and the other two will mostly just play back-up to keep them up front and take the lead if it becomes absolutely necessary. Keith and Pidge; you’re both aggressive but you can play together well through the combination of instincts and intellect. I want the two of you to aim for the finish line first. Allura, you tend to be a bit more of an offensive force while you, Hunk, are a more defensive player; you two can maintain a good sense of your surroundings and stay on guard. I want you to stay close behind them to keep them safe. Lance, you and I will bring up the last round of defenses. Between you and I, we should be able to offer a good distraction to hopefully help with keeping the other competitor’s away from Keith and Pidge.”

“Oh, so Keith gets to play the big hero? He isn’t even a Paladin anymore!” Lance snapped back angrily.

Shiro sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose, preparing to answer, while Keith signed his name and then turned and headed off again. Pidge signed her own, handed it off to Allura, then darted back to the booth to get directions to where the designated parts area was. After that, she darted after Keith, saddling up beside him and catching his arm. “Parts and manufacturing are gonna be this way,” She said, tugging him lightly. He looked like he wanted to yank out of her grasp and yell something, but he bit down the urge and let her lead him along. “So, any thought into the kind of specs we should supe this baby up with? I figured something a little bit more streamlined that’s built for speed would be the best option, but if you have any suggestions-!”

“I  _think_  Lance is an irresponsible idiot!” He barked out, turning his head and freezing as his eyes fell to Red Lion, being shown off on monitors littering the place. Her shield was up and even then, they still had her in a cage with a few guards stationed nearby. “Look at her… She wouldn’t be in this situation if he wasn’t her pilot. I don’t understand why she picked him instead of Allura. Allura never would have let her get so easily taken away. And this is his second time letting this happen! None of the rest of us have ever let that happen with our Lions!” He rambled frantically, gesturing at the screen as he spoke. Though there was anger in his tone, it wasn’t hard to read what the undercurrent of his tone was putting out.

“Keith, you don’t need to be jealous,” She said patiently.

He tensed and stared at her, his gaze vacant and hard. “I don’t have a reason to be jealous. She picked him over me in the end; no question about it,” He said.

Pidge opted against pointing out that Red hadn’t necessarily made a choice  _herself_ ; simply, she’d been forced to accept the option placed before her. Black Lion took Keith from her and she needed a pilot she thought would be competent with her, one that wouldn’t need her to coddle them. Unlike Blue Lion, Red had no patience in adjusting to a new Paladin. She never would have selected Allura, despite how skilled the Altean heiress was, simply because she had been offered to Red  _before_ she gained the knowledge and experience she now had. Blue saw the potential in Allura – much as she had seen it in Lance – and had been warm to the idea of helping to nurture that talent to a more noticeable degree. Red Lion, however, was temperamental and occasionally difficult to handle and would have been a nightmare for Allura when she was first starting out. And then, once Black Lion reconnected with Shiro, Keith left before it became a question of how the next round of Musical Lions would end.

She would never say as much out loud for fear of the backlash, but she had no doubt if Red was told to pick between the two, she’d have picked Keith. Hands down.

She reached out and set a hand on his shoulder, giving it a reassuring squeeze. “There’s no competition between the two of you, you know. Red Lion chose each of you for different reasons and I’m sure that there are days she misses you  _just_  as much as you miss her. Just because you aren’t her Paladin anymore doesn’t mean she doesn’t still care about you, after all,” She said gently. From what she’d discussed with Green, that was true of all the Lions. There were days that – even with how much they  _all_  adored their new Paladins – they still missed the Paladins they’d started out with, and there wasn’t anything wrong with that. She flashed him a small, reassuring smile and squeezed again. “Now, why don’t we go get our ship put together and get her back? I’m sure she’d be happy to see you again once this is all said and done.”

He took a deep breath and returned her smile with a small one of his own. “Thanks, Pidge,”


	3. Forest Fire

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> While they are far from smart with their words, they can both be poetic in their minds where it can remain private and personal.

She’s a living embodiment of her Lion’s element, whether she realizes it or not, and sometimes he is completely enthralled by it.

The physical aspects are easy to catch and assess. Her hair like autumn time leaves; flickering between gold and brown and orange depending on how the light chooses to shine off of it, and appearing like a bird’s nest on nights where sleep has become an enemy instead of a reprieve. Eyes as bright as the stars on a cloudless night, a hue that sings of them being painted with pure, fresh honey straight from a beehive. Her body is lithe and seems frail at first glance, akin to a sapling preparing for its first winter chill,  but there are rippling muscles under the surface with the fortitude of a well-aged oak tree in a windstorm. Lips that are petal pink and just as soft, becoming more rose-tinted when they’ve been worried on. and more addictive than the nectar of any flower he’s tasted.

But there are other things, too, that other people may not read as well as him.

Her laughter carries with it the echoes of spring time; her giggles the gentle patter of rain on a roof, her deeper laughs the rumbling of a fast-approaching thunderstorm. Her approach to fighting reminds him of a sweltering summers of his youth; quick and well-timed and carrying with them a lingering sensation that could leave an enemy sore for days – maybe even weeks – after the encounter. Her battle cry is the snapping sound of lighting and her very being the overwhelming rush of the wind during a harsh monsoon. Her tactical approaches tend to speak of the winter; harsh and cold to anyone whom should be under prepared in dealing with her. Their enemy has taken so much from her – so many people, so much time, so many precious moments – and she seeks to return the debt with more interest than they could dream. Sometimes her strikes are brief warning signs, like a light snowfall on the mountains his family liked to visit close to the holidays, but other times she is the most severe blizzard that they she can muster to be. She shuts down on the inside, turns her feelings and morality off, and focuses only on leaving them as cold and empty as they have her. She is the living embodiment of not only the message of the fall season but nature as a whole; changing to fit a situation while still remaining structurally the same.

He has fallen for her so hard and so fast he still isn’t sure what to do.

Sometimes he fears what would be if his spark caught on, that he would ravage her like flames have been known to do to works of natural beauty before.

Those times are few and often fall apart as he remembers who he has become infatuated with.

She is deceitfully formidable and impossibly resilient, just like the forests she is a living Goddess of.

—————————————————————————

She had never met someone that seemed to be made of constantly-burning embers until she met him.

From a logical standpoint, there isn’t much in the way of transparent physical appearance to give her beliefs credence. He has a pale complex and indigo eyes too dark to call to mind anything resembling a cracking fire. An argument could be made for the midnight hue of his hair, but she feels it would be a bit of a stretch. Her comparison comes more in the physicality of him. It’s how his eyes are always gleaming and eagerly like a hungry flame, watching out for something to spark at and begin kindling a full blaze. The throaty chuckles she occasionally manages to drag out of him remind her of crackle of a fresh fire being started in the hearth; just a little warm and filled with potential to grow. His anger is a fuse that is far shorter than one would expect, a strand borne of his frustration and confusion and anxiety. His teeth are flint stones, his breath pure hydrogen, and when they kiss he steals her oxygen and passes his flames on to her, too.

She believes those are mostly surface level observations that anyone else could make, given the same amount of research as herself.

The things that stand out are the ones that other people overlook, that people choose to ignore because they focus too much on the surface level of him. His icy facade of indifference hides the actual heat within; a heart the pumps not with blood or kerosene or coal, but of passion and affection for those closest to him. He will sooner burn bridges he forges with other people to protect not himself, but them, so fearful of how he can singe and scar them with all that he is. Much like a fire can’t burn and spread without something to attach to, so too do his defenses work. He requires friends and allies and people that he trusts and loves in order to actually use his anger and aggression; without those, he becomes a defective bomb, unable to do any real damage to anyone or anything around him.

She finds both sides of him, the farce and the genuine article underneath, to be charming in different ways.

She worries, though, about how long he can maintain both images before it blows up in his face and both sides are scorched away in the resulting blaze.

The fear is quickly chased away with the recollection of what exactly her object of affection truly is.

He is a living myth, a Phoenix given a new name, that will always arise from the ashes that he becomes.


	4. Jacket - NSFW

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> NSFW. Long distance relationships can be difficult at times, but then the moments of reunion are all that more important. Especially when your girlfriend is a little minx with access to your old clothes

It had been late when his ship had docked and had been grateful his entrance code still worked; after all, everyone on board had been asleep already.

He’d been a bit surprised as he did a quick round through the most popular hubs on board; checking the kitchen, the lounge, the hanger, the control room. All the places were barren of life and, judging by how the Lions looked as poised and battle-ready as ever, there was good reason for it. After doing a quick check to make sure the security mainframe was still fully armed – sometimes it shut down when an entrance code was plugged in – he then headed down the hallway towards where the bedrooms were. He kept going until he found a familiar door, plugged in the code, and quietly slipped in.

He was a bit surprised to find it was a bit tidier than the last time he’d been in. Team VolTrash was still present, but the mountain they’d been designated looked a little shorter and a little slimmer. The soft sound of quiet music flitted about the room and a quick glance revealed it to be her laptop, settled in her lap on her bed, the light of the screen turned down a bit but still illuminating her face from inside the blanket cocoon she’d made. She peered up over the top of the screen and grinned at him. “Well, hello there, stranger,” She purred, her eyes bright through her wild bangs. She had showered recently, judging by the way her hair was starting to curl at the ends. Her hair always did that when it got wet.

He chuckled a bit. “Sorry I came in so late,” He said, offering his hand to her.

She shifted and handed her laptop over to him, already knowing it would need to be moved to make room for them both. While he set the laptop on the small table beside her bed, she pushed the blanket off of herself and stretched, lacing her fingers and arching her back until she heard a quiet, satisfied pop. “Ah, I’m gonna sleep so good tonight,” She hummed.

“Oh yeah? And why is that?” He asked curiously, turning to look at her. And that was when he realized exactly what she’d gone to bed in.

Her grin turned just a bit cheeky as his eyes roved over her lithe form, almost all of her skin completely exposed. The only two articles of clothing keeping any sense of modesty intact was a pair of lacy neon green panties and his long-outgrown red jacket. Once the fit had gotten a bit too snug, he’d given it to her, knowing that sometimes she got cold working at all hours on this or that. The jacket fit her a bit better as they’d grown in the last few years, after all. He paused to look back up and meet her eye, her head cocking a bit. “See something you like?” She asked, hands reaching up to lightly glide along the open flaps.

“Oh, absolutely,” He huffed, voice taking on a husky quality as he shifted closer, leaning into her space. One hand of his came to cup the side of her face and pull her in a kiss, the other resting on the mattress beside her thigh to keep him upright, one knee resting on the mattress as well. She leaned into it eagerly, one hand slipping up to cup the nape of his neck. The kiss was slow and needy.

Which made sense. It had been nearly two months since they’d been able to see each other, though they had been able to still call and talk.

Keith certainly hadn’t expected himself to be as needy for the physical aspects of a relationship before or immediately after he and Pidge became an item. But as they fell in line with one another, he became aware of how much he loved the physical intimacy that came with being in a committed relationship. He liked being able to slide up behind her, looping his arms around her waist or shoulders, and lean against her to share the warmth. If she was working, she’d lean back against him, letting out a small hum of appreciation. If she was going over details or blueprints she would rest one of her hands on top of his, or reach back to gently stroke his cheek or hair. He grew fond of the quick pecks to his cheeks or chin or lips she’d offered if she was particularly busy and couldn’t sneak far from her work. He liked the occasions where they’d rest with their head in the others lap, his fingers braiding small portions of her hair or her fingers fiddling with his bangs. Other little gestures – heads on shoulders, the lacing of pinkie fingers – became something like a drug to him; something he yearned for, something he  _needed_.

Not that the sex wasn’t amazing. Because it  _was_. In fact, amazing was an  _understatement_.

Keith’s interest in sex was, if he had to ration a guess, about normal for an individual of his age in his position. Would he enjoy getting his rocks off with a partner every now and again? Absolutely. But he had also understood that he would only want to with a consistent partner that he felt comfortable with. He had figured that, considering what being a Paladin entailed, that he’d simply have to get his rocks off by himself. Befriending and falling for Pidge had never been something he’d thought would happen and had been even more weary about his feelings being reciprocated. But they were, and they were an item, and he learned a lot more about himself through being with her.

Specifically he learned that he liked being with a partner that could easily overthrow him.

It was a thrill, the occasional power play that arose between them. Pidge tended to be a bit more of a tease, getting him needy and frantic, but then backing off a bit to let him simmer in those feelings. He’d get too worked up and become pure putty in her hands, willing to do whatever she wanted however she wanted if he got to have a taste of her in exchange. He was a bit more of a romantic when instigating things himself; more level-headed and showing a self-restraint that no one would have thought him possible of. He liked to start out with gentle, easy signs to let her know he was wanting. Small, soft kisses to her lips or jaw or, depending on what she was wearing, her shoulder, and smoothing his hands lightly over her hips, guiding her towards him with small squeezes. As to whether or not he stuck to that approach once they were actually alone and giving in to those desires depended on the mood.

“I’m going to do the heavy lifting tonight,” He said quietly when they pull apart.

She smiled at him, and with how close they were he could see the faint flush on her cheeks. “I can’t really complain about that,” She mused, starting to shrug off the jacket.

He caught her and tugged it back on a bit. “Leave it on?” He asked.

“Oh, have a little bit of a kink, I see?” His face heated up at the tease but he couldn’t deny it. What would he even say? He couldn’t deny that there was something satisfying about his girlfriend waiting up for him wearing nothing but a pair of panties and one of his old jackets on a primal level. She didn’t push it further, though, and instead got herself settled up at the head of her bed, readjusting the pillows a bit for her comfort. Once settled, she watched her with an expectant look. He ditched his shirt and pants before crawling over her on the bed. “Hmm. Much better.” She said, reaching out with one hand to pull him back down towards her, splaying her legs so that he could settle himself between them and get as close as physically possible.

Their kisses remained languid, even as he moved to nip and suckle along her throat, as his hands crept from her hips up along her sides slowly, the folds of the jacket sliding aside a bit and his thumbs brushing the sides of her breasts. Breathy noises left her parted lips, one hand lost in his hair and the other smoothing over his back and shoulder. He pulled back from her neck to look down at the scar between her breasts, where she’d taken a shot for him on a mission and gotten a shattered sternum for her trouble. The appearance of the scar reminded him of pictures of black holes that he’d seen back when he was with the Garrison, somehow more elegant than it had any right to be given the circumstances. The bone fragments had nearly punctured either of her lungs and she’d narrowly made it out alive with nothing but the scar.

He dipped his head and pressed an open-mouthed kiss to it while his hands slid up to cup both of her breasts. She let out a small hiss and arched a bit, pressing more fully into him. He adjusted his grip on one breast so that he could tease and roll one nipple with his thumb while the other massaged, somewhat like a cat making a pillows more comfortable for them. She had once teasingly accused the action being some deep-rooted Galra instinct of his, but he still did it because he knew how much she liked it.

He moved his hand that was massaging away after a bit, replacing it with his mouth to suckle lightly and flick his tongue at the nipple lightly, delighting in how she keened. Pidge, as he learned early on, was very vocal if she was enjoying it or not. She had also told him one night, in a very blunt tone, “Understand that I am  _never_ going to fake  _anything_. If I don’t get off, I’m not going to pretend that I did for the sake of your eager or something. I will inform you that I didn’t and that information will be yours to deal with as you see fit.” After that warning, he’d made sure to take special care into learning what she liked, seeing her words as a challenge to never botch up.

His roaming hand moved down lower, sliding along her stomach in teasing circles until he reached the hem of her panties. He moved his hand along the hem, following it to her hip, and then began working to tug the offending article off. Pidge either lifted or rolled her hips in such a way that made tugging them down her slim legs that much easier. He couldn’t say for certain, as she tended to pay attention to her surroundings – even during sex – but he also knew that if both her nipples were rolled with just enough pressure simultaneously her mind would go through a quick hard boot.

With those out of the way, his hand returned to ghost two fingers along her opening, humming in satisfaction at the slick that greeted the touch. He released her breast from his mouth with a soft pop and grinned at her. “An eager beaver, hm?” He said teasingly.

She flashed him a weak glare, opening her mouth to back some sharp retort, but instead cut off with a loud, “Fuck, yes!” As he started to press one finger into her while his thumb circled her clit.

“You’ve been having a little fun while I was away?” He asked curiously, finding the digit able to move without too much issue.

“May have had a little fun earlier today. It was stressful and you weren’t here to help me deal,” She huffed out, legs spreading a bit wider as he picked up pace with the one finger.

Keith was well aware that Pidge had a few toys stashed in a locked box under her bed. He knew mostly because they were all items that they had picked out together, housed in the same space as the other things they occasionally played with in the bedroom. “And what did you do, exactly?” He asked as he pressed a second finger in alongside the first.

“Ah, yeah, j-just a little  _faster_ ,” She whined, her last word slurring a bit as he preemptively did as she desired. Her eyes drifted shut and she licked her lips. “Well, I grabbed the vib-!”

“Open your eyes and tell me,” He said, removing his hand from her breast to tilt her head to look at her a little better.

Her eyes fluttered open again, a bright spark in them, and she locked on to his gaze. “I got out that vibrator with the rotating function – you remember the one, right? It seems to be your favorite when we bring it out to play – as well as the little bullet one,” She started to say, breath catching as she regaled him. He started to scissor and briefly silenced her with a hungry kiss when she went to cry out in delight. This kiss was messier than the others, a small string of spit still connecting their heaving mouths when he pulled back. She took a stealing breath, grinding her hips into his hand as he continued to hammer into that same spot, and for a moment seemed dazed as to where she’d been. “I used the little one to get the juices going, just using it to trace and glide along my clit, and then went to town with the bigger one, pretending it was you. I rode it like a girl possessed and had to muffle screaming your name into a pillow or else get the others confused.”

“That,” He said, a little too smug as her walls started to tighten around his fingers, “or they would have realized that you have toys on hand. Though I think they may already know that, after that one incident.” He slowly pulled his fingers out and gave her a chaste kiss on the lips, wiping them off on the side of his boxers.

“No way the others know,” She panted back, her hand in his hair relaxing a bit. Both her hands moved down to help him get his boxers down and out of the way, ghosting her fingers along his cock as she let them roam his body. “Hunk is a real bro and he’d never tell the others something that personal.”

“Helped us acknowledge that we should probably make sure to put the gag back in the box before we get lazy post-orgasm, though,” He chuckled, hands settling on her hips as he ground his cock along her entrance, making sure to press it along her clit with every rock of his hips.

“Ah, fuck, don’t tease! That’s my shtick, you jerk!” She whined, pinching one of his nipples in warning. He hissed and his hips stuttered a bit from the quick shock.

He leaned down and kissed her lightly before he finally pressed in, both of them groaning in unison. Her walls spasmed around him, clenching down around him snugly. He didn’t see a point to playing around and started out with a rougher pace, grunting a bit as he pulled completely out and slammed right back home. He pulled back from the kiss and watched her through hooded lids, lips still turned up in a smirk. Between the pillows and the leather of the jacket, he could see the lower portion of her hair was becoming a complete mess. The popped collar of the jacket did little hide the marks scattered along either side of her neck and the two folds remained open leaving her breasts exposed to his gaze and the cool air of the room. He pressed his head down again and mouthed at the opposite breast this time, using his grip on her hips to help with the momentum and angles.

She cried out loud and frantic when he found just the right spot and clawed at his back and hair like a drowning man to a piece of driftwood. “There, there! Oh God, keep going!” She pleaded, her words a bit garbled in her frantic want. He growled quietly in response, as if to tell her he had no intention of stopping, and picked up more speed. Her nonsense sputtering started to punctuate each thrust in, her walls becoming so incredibly tight he wondered how he was maintaining his ability to pull out.

It came to a head when he hammered the spot one last time, dead on and at full force, and she shrieked out her completion, nails tearing into him hard enough that he knew there would be little pinpricks of blood. He bucked into a few more times but came shortly after, biting down hard on her breast as he rode it out. He slowly released her breasts as he came down, pausing to gently trace the mark with the tip of his tongue in an attempt to soothe it. She patted his hair in return and he smiled, leaning up to kiss her softly.

“Gonna have the best sleep I’ve had in a while,” Pidge purred, shifting to tuck her head under his chin and nuzzle in eagerly. He chuckled as he carefully rearranged them on their sides, pulling her as close as possible. The way his sweaty arm stuck to the material of the jacket, which he should have found unpleasant, he instead took as a gold star signifying a night well spent.


	5. Sphinx

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Minor gore warning! A battle goes horribly, horribly wrong and leaves the team with the devastating acceptance of fate. Keith, however, isn’t a big fan of taking things lying down. And Allura may have a quest that can help him.

Never before had he hated the Blade or its mantra as much as he did in that moment.

They’d been heavily engaged with the Galra, taking and giving fire at a rate that could make anyone’s head spin. While the Blade offered cover, Pidge and Allura were inside the main Galran fleet fighter, pilfering as many confidential files as they could, a member of the Blade with them and transferring the information directly to their commander as well. The goal was to locate a group of leaders from various rebellions on planets they’d yet to liberate, to gain their alliance and then take active steps to free their homes. This would also tell them which planets they’d most likely have allies on for additional support when they did raise Hell.

They managed to get all the information necessary, but more Galran reinforcements arrived. Hawert, the Blade leader in charge of the attack while Kolivan was tending to a separate covert operation, had ordered all Blade fighters to stand back. “We’ve got what we came here for,” He had said, tone cold but satisfied, “now fall back.” Keith had found it strange and dragged behind the others a bit, his gaze fixed on the Galran fleet fighter ship, watching for Pidge and Allura to make it out. After a moment, Blue Lion came charging out, but a second later the whole fighter blew up.

With no sign of Green Lion.

Panic settled in and he rushed into the wreckage, shutting off his communicator as Hawert barked at him to follow his orders. Allura caught up with him in the search early on, the two of them weaving between floating pieces of scrap wordlessly. He could have opened a communication channel with her, but opted against it. Talking would distract him and they could talk back on the ship.

They found Green Lion and an entire portion of her face had been blown to smithereens. Even from within his ships cockpit, he could see through Green to her own cockpit, feeling nausea bubble up at the armored figure inside, prone and floating just a bit above the pilot’s seat. Allura shifted Blue Lion to close her jaw partially over the exposed and damaged portion of Green, and he floated closer, landing partially on both Lions to keep them from drifting away from one another. He knew she was disembarking from Blue to retrieve Pidge, as leaving her in Green’s cockpit being too risky with it so heavily exposed in zero gravity.

Once Allura returned, Blue released her grip on Green and he moved back, pressing the front end of his ship against the back of the Green Lion. Blue joined him, pushing her snout beside him, and the two started to push Green along. He could see the other Lions and Castle Ship heading their way, as well, and was a bit comforted that Allura had gone ahead and called for them. He told himself that Pidge would be fine, that they’d get her into a cryopod and she’d just need a bit of rest, that they’d been quick enough on the uptake.

When he disembarked his ship, however, he realized how far from the truth that was.

Pidge was completely limp in Allura’s arms as the princess barked orders, Coran rushing over with a stretcher and attached cart of other medical supplies, a light blue medical smock and gloves and a mask over his mouth and nose, while the other Paladins darted over from leaving their Lions. Her helmet was shattered completely, blood dripping down through the cracks in the screen and metal casing. Her entire left arm was exposed and gory, making his stomach churn, but it was the decently sized piece of shrapnel cutting straight through her side that had his mind reeling.

 _What_  happened? What  _happened_?  _What happened_?

He didn’t realize he was actually screaming the words until Hunk’s hands were on his shoulder, trying to carefully guide him away from the scene. He shoved past, frantic, as he watched Lance, having pulled on a space set of medical gear that had been brought out with the rest of the equipment, help Coran find a vein on Pidge’s good arm and get her hooked up to a blood bag. “Calm down, we’ve got her. It’s gonna be okay, Keith,” Hunk said, his voice cracking with his high anxiety and attempts to remain calm. He shoved past him and darted over to Allura and Shiro. Coran and Lance were rushing away with Pidge, talking quiet and frantic to her prone form.

“It… It was the Blade member. The Galra got some kind of tracker on him, and he started panicking. Pidge was trying to calm him down, telling him that she could get the tracker out, but instead he activated from kind of explosive device that he’d had on him!” Allura stammered out, her hands clenched together tight in front of her, trying to calm her frantic shaking.

“He blew himself up in the cockpit?” Shiro asked in shock.

“He said it was his orders, in case of a situation such as this,” She insisted, her gaze falling from him to Keith and the approaching Hunk. They all knew that the Blade valued success over even the lives of its members but it hadn’t reached this extent for them. Keith had seen it first hand himself, with Antok and many others after him, but never had they dragged an outsider into their twisted ends before.

They all headed out to settle in the hallway outside the room where Lance and Coran were working on Pidge, leaning against the wall and slumping on the floor. They weren’t sure how long they sat there before the door finally opened, Coran walking out with a somber look. The gloves and mask were covered in blood, sending a chill down Keith’s spine and his stomach rolling. “We’ve done all we can, but… If we remove the shrapnel, she’ll bleed out before we can get her into the cryopod,” He explained quietly.

“But… But what if you put her on an IV and get her into the cryopod?” Hunk asked, pushing himself up from the floor to stand upright.

“We’d have to remove the shrapnel in order to get her in the pod, but we’d also have to take her off the IV… If we took her off the IV, though, she could still bleed out before a significant amount of damage can be healed,” He explained, shaking his head a bit. He took a quivering breath and slowly released it. “We… The best we can do is keep her going for a bit longer. Reach out to the Rebels, see how quickly Matthew can get here, and we’ll see what we can do about keeping her going until then.”

They could hear a choked, broken sound from inside the room, too low in tone to be Pidge herself, before Coran disappeared back inside.

Hunk’s head drooped and Shiro took a stealing breathe. “I’ll go make the call. It’s my responsibility, as leader of the team, to contact the family of such a situation,” He said, his voice tight but serious. Allura slowly slid down along the wall to settle on the ground, dropping her head on to her knees.

Keith growled and whirled around to face Shiro, glare set and defiant. “So, what, we’re just going to  _give up_  on her  _just like that_?” He snarled. He couldn’t accept that this is how things will end, that this will be her last stand. There were still so many things they planned to do, so many challenges to face down together. She hadn’t found her father yet, and he hadn’t found his mother. They had promised to look out for each other.

“Keith, this is sadly a part of war. I don’t like it anymore than you do, but there’s nothing we can reasonably do in this situation,” He said, tired and resigned, before turning and walking away. Hunk stared from Keith and Allura to Shiro before slumping and following after him, most likely heading off to do some baking or something to try and find solace.

Keith balled his fists before whipping around and pounding into the wall, hitting over and over until his knuckles hurt and even beyond. His hands had reached a fuzzy sensation, just a painful sting along the edges of the dark red marks, and a small dent was left in the metal plating he’d attacked. “My father told me once of a legendary beast,” Allura said quietly, lifting her head a bit to look at him. She rested her chin on knees and he paused, turning to fully face her. “Zarkon visited this planet once, when Honerva’s health first fell. The legends state that the mighty creature, if faced by a worthy warrior of noble blood and noble intention, will gift that warrior with a magic elixir that can heal any wound or ailment; physical, emotional, or mental. When Zarkon returned, he said only that it was a fool’s errands, but… Well, it might be a shot in the dark but it’s all that we have. It could be a way to save Pidge.” She said cautiously while standing.

“Can you get the coordinates?” He asked, hands falling to his sides as the flutter of hope blossomed in his belly.

Allura moved to rise with him, nodding. “It’ll take a little bit of searching… I know that it’s somewhere in the Filkutar quadrant. Start heading there and I’ll send the specific coordinates to you once I find it,” She said seriously. They embraced briefly before the two of them hurried off to their respective tasks. They were gonna be chasing the clock the whole way.

……………………………………………………………………

The planet in question was a thick, jungle-like environment filled with lush foliage and enough hot air to rival Lance back when they first became Paladins. Unlike the Paladin flight suits and armor, the Blade uniforms were more meant for covert movements and physical coverage. They lacked the automated temperature modifications of the Paladin armor so he was completely on his own, sweat making the suit rub against him uncomfortably, his hair plastered to his forehead and cheeks. “There should be a temple, made of a bright stone that will be hard to miss. The beast is said to live inside,” Allura had explained to him before he landed. Once he landed, communications would be choppy and difficult to maintain so they’d made sure he understood everything before he entered.

The temple was easy to locate from his ship but a decent hike from where he’d been able to land. His luxite blade came in handy as he rushed through the thicket, doing his best to be quick while not getting tripped up too much. He reached the summit in what he considered to be decent time, pausing at the long staircase that led up to the entrance to check the wrist band Allura had given him.

It was hooked to the monitors tracking Pidge’s vitals in the castle and had been set up with a count down. Matt would be sent along immediately but he was still a good six hours out. Coran had promised that he could keep her alive at least that long so her brother could say goodbye. The flight had been about two hours – Allura unable to make a portal for him as Shiro was occupying the main deck – and the hike up another half an hour, leaving him a little over three hours to get through this whole ordeal with the elixir and get back to the ship. “If you can get the elixir and make it back to the ship, I can create a portal for you to warp back through. But I need you to be quick,” Allura had explained.

The temple was a bright silver hue that stuck out against the dark greens and browns of the plant life, catching the light and sending off beams something akin to a disco ball. From what he could see, the temple had been erected with a lot of care placed into its appearance, seeing many beautiful and intricate designs scrawled and molded all about. Bits of a yellow-green material that reminded him of moss was growling all around it, in various patches at varying degrees of length and width, hiding a decent portion of the work down. He found it to be a bit of a shame, as he was certain it was beautiful underneath all the overgrow. The two statues settled on either end of the brick banisters were what really caught his eye, though.

They were of a feline-esque creature, the same creature, but settled in two drastically different positions. One was laying on it’s stomach with it’s fore paws stretched out in front of it and back paws curled underneath it. It seemed to have a long tail with some kind of small mace-like object at the end. There weren’t any other special marks identifying it, other than it having three sets of eyes, all three shut as if it were sleeping. The other stature was the creature sitting upright, tail curled in front of its paws, and the lower set of eyes were cracked open slightly. They were surprisingly nondescript compared to everything else.

They reminded him a bit of the pictures he’d seen of sphinx statutes back in grade school.

He looked up towards the entrance at the top of the stairs then noticed a small plaque placed beneath the stature that was sitting upright, partially hidden by a bit of the moss-like substance. He leaned a bit closer, dusting the substance away, then jumped when the plague began to shimmer and shine with a bright white light. The statute’s eyes popped open wide and turned to focus on him, glowing with the same light, causing him to freeze up. His grip on his blade tightened, tensing in preparation for a fight, but then after a moment the light faded and the statute returned to its previous position.

When he looked back at the plaque, words in English were suddenly etched into the surface in a bronze hue. “This is the temple of the Almighty Jufaruta, Guardian of the Sacred Liquor of Life. The temple shall only allow this liquid be taken of those most deserving. Thou must taste without consuming, must sense without seeing, must trust without knowing, must speak without hearing. Only those that can accomplish these virtues shall have any chance of meeting the Almighty Jufaruta and partaking of its treasures,” He read aloud, turning his attention back to the large doors of the temple. He took a deep breath, switched his blade back into knife form, and slipped it into his holster. “Here goes everything.” He mumbled, steeling his resolve.

He had to succeed, whatever awaited him inside. For Pidge.


	6. Aquamarine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Continuation of Chapter 5 fic; warning for a lot blood! With time running out, Keith is now face-to-face with the Almighty Jufaruta to determine if he is worthy of the elixir that could save Pidge’s life.

The inside of the temple was dank, smelling of stale water and damp dirt, and the chamber he walked into was a deep, rich violet color. There were bright yellow tapestries depicting the same creature as the statues fighting off various other creatures to protect the denizens of the planet. There was another small staircase across the room from him, leading to the next chamber, but settled on the top of the steps was a large beast similar to the statures outside. They were the size of a horse, with a thick coat of sandy colors with a white muzzle and black tufts on its ears and in intricate swirls along its shoulders and paws. The two upper sets of eyes were closed and the lower set were just barely cracked open. It’s tail swayed and twisted behind it, the mace-like object seeming to be made of soft, fur-like material. “Are you the Jufaruta guarding this elixir?” He asked cautiously.

The Jufaruta turned, walking toward the open passage to the next area without a sound, and a small platform raised in the center of the room. There was a small golden jar on the top.

“Wait, what am I supposed to do? Can’t you give me a hint?” He called out, frantic.

It looked back at him over it’s shoulder, standing just past the threshold of the next chamber, before it’s third set of eyes closed and the door slammed shut behind it.

“Okay, so I’m on my own?” He grumbled angrily, pinching the bridge of his nose. Suddenly, a thought occurred to him, a conversation from a long time ago.

“ _These things never make any sense,” He grumbled, his head tilted as they watched the protagonist of the film jump past a pit of spikes._

“ _What do you mean?” Pidge asked, lifting her head from his shoulder to gaze up at him curiously. She reached into the bowl of psuedo-popcorn they had brought out with them for the film, grabbed a handful, and tossed a piece into his mouth. They had decided to marathon a few action flicks since they had the free time and, being on to the third film, he’d noticed a trend developing in regards to Gaduratu’s most recent exploration of some extinct-cultures ancient artifacts._

“ _These ancient temples_ always _have super-complicated secrets to figure out in order to get through them,” He said, indicating the latest chamber that was filled with marked stones and a floor of lava._

“ _They aren’t super-complicated,” She explained with a small snort, “if you’re good with riddles. That’s all they really are at their core, after all; riddles that you have to solve in order to get through. They’re not too terribly difficult if you concentrate. Just think of it like the trials from when you were joining the Blade.”_

He took a deep breathe and slowly approached the jar in the center and eyed it curiously. “What did that plaque say, again? Something about tasting without consuming, sensing without seeing, trusting without knowing and speaking without hearing, I think? So I guess this would be that first one then,” He mumbled twisting off the top of the jar. Underneath what looked to be a long, slim needle of some sort. There was a small liquid dripping from the jagged tip; either a poison or some kind of drug, he reasoned.

With a nervous gulp, he reached forward and prodded the tip of his index finger against it. The tip was as sharp as he expected, leaving a small cut. He then pressed the cut into the liquid, forcing himself to hold steady despite the sting until he was sure a decent amount had gotten into the wound. A rumbling noise echoed in the chamber and the door lifted again. “So I guess that was the right approach. Thanks for the tip, Pidge,” He mumbled, glancing from the cut to the open entrance. He paused long enough to use a small bandage to cover the little mark and then rushed forward.

The Jufaruta was settled beside a large glowing orb in the center of the room, which seemed to be suspended by an electric current running through it via two plates on the ceiling and floor respectively, cleaning it’s paw with long strokes of its pale blue tongue. The walls of the room were a bright and welcoming yellow hue. There were more tapestries hanging from the walls, identical to the ones in the previous room, but were actually a smoky grey color this time around. The Jufaruta’s lowest set of eyes were open now, a luminous and glowing orange color with lime green pupils that looked like a diamond as opposed to a circle, and the second set up were cracked just a bit now. It perked up and licked it’s chops at the sight of him, almost seeming to be grinning. It carefully hoped down from the orb and took a few steps closer, it’s nose twitching as it sniffed around.

It got close enough that Keith could have touched it, gently tapping its cold nose against the very tip of his covered finger, before letting a soft purr-like sound that he took as satisfaction. It then retreated back towards the orb, tail flicking back and forth in an almost amused fashion. Keith noticed in specific that the little orb at the end seemed to be more solid and firm now as well. It hopped up in one long jump, and skid it the edge of it’s tail along the plate keeping the orb in place, seeming to flick some kind of switch. It wobbled and teetered, barely kept in place by the lower current, and it began to get darker, the top half of the orb flickering off. The rumbling continued and that was when Keith realized that it wasn’t only the orb wobbling, but the whole room itself. The orb maintained both the lighting of the room but also the gravitational pull of it.

He received another purr as his only warning before the Jufaruta dragged it’s tail along the lower plate and sent the room into darkness and orbit.

Keith growled and pulled out his blade, digging it into the ground below him as everything flipped upside down around him. He heard the orb crash into what had previously been the ceiling and roll about as the room slowly rocked back and forth. “Okay, the second part… Sense without seeing… Which I assume means that I need to get that orb back in place and turn those switches back on again,” He grumbled to himself before there was a whooshing noise in his ear, something loud slamming into the stone just past his head, landing in beside his sword. A skittering noise that reminded him of insect sounds started to creep closer and he growled. “Of course there had to more to this than that!” He snapped, yanking his sword free and curling into himself as he headed towards the ground, closing his eyes and taking a deep breath.

Sense without seeing, huh? Well, good thing they’d had that training exercise with the Lions.

He forced himself to find his center and suddenly a strange tingling sensation crept up from the small cut in his finger, up his arm and settled all throughout his body. When he opened his eyes, it felt as if he wasn’t actually seeing, but instead reading the energy. The room was still pure black, but the walls were outlined in a low dim white hue while the orb was a near-blinding gold. It was also rolling its way to be beneath him. He reached his arms out and pushed on it once he got close enough, pushing it back and managing to get his feet settled on it. It swayed from side to side and he had to keep moving, but he had a decent handle on it. He stole a glance up to see the creature that had attacked him, which was outlined with bright red energy, hissed and dropped down to join him.

Through what the energy revealed, it was like a giant three-tailed scorpion with horns akin to that of a bull. It dropped and narrowly missed landing on him, pushed back by his block with his sword. He growled as it’s jagged back legs jabbed into the orb, cracking it a bit and creating a makeshift foothold for itself. It swung at him with all three tails, trying to impale him, but he shifted and blocked. He stole a quick glance around then smirked, shifting to push the orb to the left.

When he did, the creature hissed in distress as it was dragged along in the wide circle.

It was hard keeping his balance as he ran atop the sphere, managing to flip from the original ceiling to one side of the room, but he managed it somehow. And as long as he kept moving, the creature seemed unable to dislodge it’s limbs from where they’d stuck them in. He grinned and looked at the wall opposite him, trying to track down the first platform that needed to be reactivated. Once it was locked partly back into place it was just a matter of using his jet pack to reach the upper switch. The creature hissed again and one of it’s tails swung at him blindly, narrowing missing his cheek. He stumbled back, rolling the orb, then growled. He ran across the orb until where the creature was pinned was underneath the orb and then charged forward.

He flinched at the loud crunch of the creature underneath the weight of the glorified pinball but quickly focused again.

From where he was positioned, he would be able to reach the switch if he jumped for it. He walked along the wall until he was face to face with it. He only knew where it was because, strangely enough, it was the only portion of the room that wasn’t lit up with some kind of energy. He felt around and smirked at what felt like a slim, narrow piece jutting out from a part of it. A quick flick up and sudden;y the room rumbled again, the orb starting to float beneath his feet.

He jumped free of it and activated his jet pack, making his way towards the top as the light slowly began to creep back into the room. He used his blade to nudge the other switch back in to place, worried that the current might zap him or something. The whole room was briefly enveloped in light so bright he had to shut his eyes, and when he opened them again his vision had returned to normal. A quick glance around the room revealed that any damage that may have been done by the orb crashing and rolling around was gone, as well as the nick in the stone from where he’d lodged his blade. There also seemed to be no evidence of the strange scorpion beast that had attacked him.

But the Jufaruta was also gone. Meaning it had probably snuck out once the room turned into a carnival ride.

He headed through the next passageway, using his jet pack still in hopes of spending the process along. This room was a smoky grey while the tapestries were an almost teal color this time. The center of the room, however, was a bit strange. Unlike being the same color as the ceilings or walls as the other two rooms had been, the floor seemed to be make of soil here. He scoffed a bit and focused on the open passageway ahead of him, assuming that this room was just a small rest spot before the last two trials. The minute he passed to about the halfway point of the room his jet pack suddenly cut out and he was plummeting downwards. The surface he fell into was not soil, but more akin to something like the bed of a swamp, and he ended up only being in up to his waist. “ _Damnit_!” He cursed, trying to push his way through it. The more he squirmed, though, the farther in he sunk towards the center.

It was something like quick sand, he realized with a small snarl. It didn’t take long until one of his arms was completely submerged and the other was only loose because he had the foresight to lift it above his head. “Why are you doing this, Keith?” A tired voice asked in front of him.

His head shot up and he gasped at the figure squatting down in front of him. “Pidge,” He breathed.

She looked like her but also unlike her, as odd as it sounded. She wasn’t clad in her Paladin armor any longer, but was still wearing her flight suit and she still have bits of dried blood and grime on her. He knew she wasn’t physically with him; both because it was a logical impossibility but also because she cast no shadow and she seemed to be hovering less than a centimeter above the strange molasses-like substance. She leaned her elbows on her bent knees and flashed him a small, sad smile. “Were you expecting Santa Claus?”

“How are you here?” He asked, his struggling halting completely. If he didn’t move, he noticed in the back of his mind, it seemed like the substance stopped pulling on him so much.

“Astral projection,” She explained with a small shrug. She then looked back at how deep he’d sunken in and sighed. “Keith, this isn’t going to help anything, you know.”

“I’ll be fine. I’ll figure a way out of this,” He said, glaring down at the dark brown liquid.

“You know that isn’t what I meant,” She said. His head snapped up to focus in on her, a heavy weight made of dread starting to weigh down on his stomach. “You need to stop this. This whole mission… It’s ridiculous. You’re just wasting time and resources.”

“No, I’m not!”

“A long time ago, you told me that the lives of two people weren’t more important than the rest of the universe,” She said calmly. He tensed up and bit the inside of his cheek to keep from arguing. “I have accepted that I won’t be making it out of this alive, and now you need to. I have enough strength to pull you out of there and get you back to the ledge before I have to return to my body and wait for the final moment. This is the way it has to be, Keith.” She offered one hand to him and he stared between it and her, feeling his heart start to ache. A flicker of movement behind her caught his attention suddenly.

It was the Jufaruta. The second set of eyes were now open – lime green irises with bright pink pupils – and the third set was cracked.  _Trust without knowing_.

He took a breath and grabbed her wrist, pulling her towards him. She let out a small startled noise and he only stopped tugging when their foreheads were nearly touching. He tilted his head and gently pressed his cheek against her hand, surprised that it felt real but disappointed at how cold it was, and held her gaze steady with his own. “I  _will_  save you, Pidge. I promise,” He vowed before taking another deep breath, releasing her, and willingly diving underneath the surface of whatever he was trapped in.

“Keith!” She cried just as he disappeared, but then everything went silent. He tried flapping one of his hands near his ear, expecting to hear the slight jostle of water, but no sounds came from it. He shifted and started to swim in the direction he’d been getting pulled towards. The closer he got, the easier moving got, until he reached a point where he simply let whatever current it was drag him along. He tried to remain calm the longer he was under, but as he got closer to running out, he became fearful that he had chosen the wrong path. His mouth opened, letting what little air he had left out, and he grabbed at his throat.

And suddenly he was falling again.

He landed on a soft, blush surface that slowly slid apart and pushed him down, kind of like some strange automated slide. He forced his eyes open and took in a heaving breath, looking up at the dimly glowing ceiling of what he could only call an underground cavern. There were stalactites hanging from the ceiling, little flickering stones of various colors decorating them, and for a moment he just laid there pliant and trying to catch back up. There was a dull ache in his head, so he pressed his thumbs up against the tops of his eyes to try and get it to subside, at least temporarily. He then smirked and flipped the bird at the ceiling. “I was right,” He said before lifting his head and starting to push up.

As he did, the material he was leaning back against shifted to help push him upright. The whole area that he was in was lit solely by the stones in the stalactites, creating a pathway towards a large, glowing room a few feet away. Still a bit unsteady on his feet, he moved at a regular walking space along the path, wondering what the next trial the Jufaruta had for him would entail. The only virtue left was speaking without hearing, but he wasn’t exactly sure how that worked.

The cavern he walked into was a gorgeous underground lake.

The room was filled to the brim with pastel colored stone, with a narrow path leading to a circular sitting area in the dead center of the lake, and bore a pleasant aroma that made him think of milk and honey. There were two small benches there, with Pidge settled at one and the Jufaruta seated beside her. The Jufaruta was sitting behind the bench with it’s fore paws resting on the empty space beside Pidge, all three eyes open and watching Keith with what he could only call amusement. Despite how far away from it he was, it’s eyes were glowing so bright he could still make out the colors; bright pink for the irises with pupils that were the bright orange of the lowest sets irises. He stole a quick glance at the waters of the lake, where he was certain the smell was coming from. It was the same color as the tapestries in the other room and he now recognized the color as being aquamarine.

He looked ahead and walked along the path towards the Jufaruta, his headache becoming more aggressive with each step.

“Please, take a seat, traveler,” Pidge said once he got within earshot, her lips turning up a small grin and one hand gesturing with an elegant wave. Keith scowled and then gasped when he looked at her eyes.

They were not the usual warm honey tint he was used to, but had become three rings of orange, green and pink. “So you created a figment of Pidge to try and trick me,” He growled lowly, but moved to do as he was told. Once he was seated, he crossed his arms and let one leg bounce, rage rushing through him. But how had the creature figured out what Pidge looked and sounded like? Or know about her at all?

Pidge giggled and covered her mouth with one hand, an act far too demure for his liking. “Heavens me, you think so loud! But to answer your question simply, no, this is not an illusion or a trick. I was able to call forward this young woman’s astral self by using your memories to put together what was motivating you through my trials!” She said calmly. As she spoke the Jufaruta purred, low and pleased, along with her. “Which, I must say, I am impressed. It has been many a century since last a warrior came to seek my fortunes and even more so since they made it this far. Tell me, what brings you here?”

“I have come to get the elixir, so that I can save her – Pidge – from dying,” He said, looking first at the Jufaruta itself and then to Pidge when he specified her name. His gaze softened on her astral form seated there. “She shouldn’t be dying like this, not right now.”

Pidge heaved a small sigh and rolled her eyes. “Is  _that_  all? You are not the first come for the elixir with such a reason. Playing God under the false pretense of saving a loved one seems to be a favorite of the selfish that have come here before you,” She said, seeming bored now.

“She isn’t meant to die now or like this,” He said, forcing himself to remain calm despite the rage slowly brewing inside of him.

“You do not know that; you are simply deciding that for yourself,” She scoffed. It got under his skin, how this thing was using her voice and her mouth to tell him lies. “The truth tends to be difficult for baser life forms such as yourself to hear, but I won’t censor myself. Now, either explain to me why your desire deserves to be fulfilled before I eviscerate you for wasting my time.”

“That’s the thing; it doesn’t necessarily deserve to be fulfilled,” Keith admitted, causing the Jufaruta to perk up. All six eyes blinked in unison and it said nothing, so he continued on. “The fact is that everyone’s morality is different, and all requests are selfish in some way, shape or form. There’s nothing I can say or do to truly convince you that my reason for wanting this elixir is any better than anyone else. All I can do is be genuine in saying that I love Pidge and I am afraid of losing her. And I would rather rush off to take a shot in the dark to save her than simply accept that there’s nothing I can do to change this.” The Jufaruta stared at him for a moment before it grinned again, Pidge’s expressions mirroring it, and both their eyes began glowing with the same white lights the statutes had emanated outside.

When he was able to see again, he was in the first room all over again, the golden jar sealed before him. The Jufaruta was seated at the top of the stairs again, but he noticed there was no longer a passageway behind him. Astral Pidge was gone, as well. He looked from the Jufaruta to the jar before cautiously twisting off the lid.

Instead of the needle and dripping drug, the jar was hollowed out and filled near to the brim with the aquamarine liquid from the underground cavern. He stared at his reflection in the small surface before slowly lifting his head to stare at the amused creature watching him. The tingling sensation from before surged through him, and his mouth opened without his urging. “I see with eyes that are unclouded, baser life form. By speaking to me on my terms and rejecting to hear the logic of the world you hail from, I chose to fill your request,” When his mouth closed, the sensation was gone and he shook his head in surprise.

“Thank you, Almighty Jufaruta, He said, quick but sincere, and bowed to it before snatching up the jar and making a beeline out of the temple. According to the time, he’d be able to make it fifteen minutes before Pidge’s time was up if he was fast.

…………………………………………………………

In the end, he made it even sooner. He had apparently impressed the Jufaruta quite a bit because his ship had been sitting right outside of the temple when he stepped out, which saved him a full thirty minutes of hiking. The minute he was out of the thicket and able to open the comms, he called up the Castle Ship and told them what he’d acquired. Shiro had been stunned but also clearly thrilled, turning around and starting to bark orders to the rest of the team about getting everything set up in preparation for whatever the procedure could entail. Allura had flashed him a proud smile before telling him that she’d get in touch with Matt to let him know that Pidge should be healed and safe once he arrived.

Keith had flown reckless and fast before but never as much so as he did making it back to the Team.

Coran greeted him the minute he disembarked and the two walked as quick and in step toward the medical wing as they could. “How much did it give you?”

“The jar is completely full,” He said, looking from door to door in search of the one Pidge was in.

“How much do we need to give her to heal her?” He asked as they rounded a corner. The rest of the team was standing outside of the door, watching them with anxious and red-rimmed eyes.

“Dunno. Gonna give her a bit, see how much it does, and give her more as I need to,” He said bluntly as they headed into the room. Lance and Coran were right behind him while Hunk, Shiro and Allura watched through the large window into the room. The curtains had been drawn earlier but they were wide open now, leaving them to gaze at his back as he came to her side. The shrapnel was still in her, but it had been shaved down some. “We’re gonna have to remove that first, or else the injury might try to heal around it.” He pointed out.

“I’ll get a fresh blood bag ready,” Lance said, darting over to the cooling unit that they were kept in. Keith had never been more grateful that Lance had taken an additional interest in the healing and medical technology of Altean’s as he was in that moment. Once it was all hooked up and situated, Lance headed over to another drawer and started shifting through until he returned with a syringe. “We can put the elixir in this to make it easier. If we wake her up to have her drink it after we move that metal out of her, she might go into shock and choke on it. If we inject it straight into her heart it should spread fast enough before she can bleed out.” He nodded and opened the jar, watching as Lance filled it up. He made a small noise of surprise at the color and then set it on the small supply table beside Pidge’s bed.

“You might want to step back for this,” Coran advised. Keith did as he was told, moving to stand in the space above Pidge’s head so Lance could take his spot and leaving the closed jar on the supply table in case they needed more of it. Between Lance and Coran, they shifted Pidge slowly and carefully to her good side so they could remove the shrapnel. An egregious amount of blood gushed out from both ends of the wound and for a moment Keith felt panicked that she’d be dead before anything more could be done. Her chest had been rising and falling slowly as it was, but with the severity of the hemorrhaging it started to slow even more. With a small, determined growl, Lance seized up the syringe, jammed it down in the center of her heart, and pushed down on the syringe plunger steadily until it was empty.

A quiet thump sounded from outside the room and Hunk’s face disappeared from the viewing. Keith felt a pang of sympathy; if not for his adrenaline pumping so hard he would have fainted, too.

The three watched, holding their breath, as slowly little flickers of light began to bloom from Pidge’s injuries. They glimmered and gleamed like the stones in the cavern, appearing over where her skin had been sliced and diced, and then fading out to the same soft peach color as her skin. Her chest began to heave more and more, breathing steady and normal, and slowly she cracked her eyes, whining a bit at the bright lights around her. “Katie?” Keith breathed uneasily, shaky hands coming up to hover just above her face.

They opened about halfway and shifted to fix on him, tired but also the breathtaking brown hue he’d become enamored by. She flashed him a tired smile, licking her lips a bit in preparation for speaking. “Let Kolivan know I’m kicking his ass next time I see him,” She croaked out, trying to be playful.

A hiccuping sob of relief bubbled out of him and he pressed his forehead against her, hands finally resting against her cheeks to trace with his thumbs. “I’ll hold him while you hit,”


	7. Loner

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nihaar pressed one paw to her muzzle, a laugh on the verge of bubbling out, and stole a glance at Adwru beside her. The other Blade member rolled his eyes, set his small screen down, and pinned the rookies before him with a skeptical look. “You know very little about Keith, don’t you?”

“They say he is a one-man army,” Gultat whispered conspiratorially, his gaze shifting from his associates to the pelt-less half-Galran leaning against the far wall. His arms were crossed though he had a small communication device of some kind in one hand, shifting along on the touch screen to look at something. “He came to the Blade with a thirst for blood and yearning to take Zarkon’s head himself. They say he once went toe-to-toe with the tyrant with no one else, piloting one of the Lions of Voltron!”

“ _Are you kidding me_?” Ahcom squeaked excitedly, slamming their hands down on the table they were seated at. Their eyes were practically glowing at the information.

“Keep it  _down_ , kitten-brain! Do you  _want_  the senior operatives to hear you?” Another member at the table, Bopud, hissed angrily.

Ahcom huffed but settled back in, crossing their arms and tapping the table with their three fingers anxiously. “What else do they say about him?” They asked.

Gultat smirked. “Despite working for the Blade, and even piloting two different Lions,” He said, pausing briefly at Ahcom’s gasping echo of the words  _two Lions_ , “he is known to be better when left to complete missions alone. They say that he is a living embodiment of an Ewita; a lone survivor that will slaughter any opponent he comes across, regardless of their size or power over him. Countless enemies have fallen at his feet, left as nothing more than a whimpering mess, screaming for mercy!” A small amused snort from the head of the table caused the three rookies to jump to attention, Gultat scowling a bit. “Do you find something funny, Nihaar?” He sneered.

The female in question grinned widely, her left ear twitching in amusement. “Oh,  _absolutely_. Listening to you prattle on about things you have no  _real_  knowledge of is  _hilarious_ ,” She mused happily. She shifted to elbow the other older Galran settled beside her, reading through a few reports. “Ain’t it funny, Adwru?”

“Nihaar, not now. I’m verifying the training schedule we’ll be running them through today,” He said, waving one hand at her halfheartedly.

“I know more than  _you_ , Nihaar!  _I_  actually listen to what the others tell me about the living legends!” Gultat huffed back angrily. The pelt-less half-Galran across the room chuckled a bit, almost as if overhearing the conversation himself, but his gaze never left the strange device in his hands.

Nihaar pressed one paw to her muzzle, a laugh on the verge of bubbling out, and stole another glance at Adwru beside her. The other Blade member rolled his eyes, set his small screen down, and pinned the rookies before him with a skeptical look. “You know very little about Keith, don’t you?”

“You mean  _Commander Kogane_! He’s an  _authority figure_  around here!” Bopud retaliated, preening with smugness.

Despite his tenure with the Blade being littered with moments of disobedience and insubordination, it was clear to everyone that Keith Kogane was a valiant soldier. His legacy carried on through the halls of the Blade in muted whispers by each new crop of Blade trainees, regardless of how small they tended to be. Normally they were easy enough to ignore, the constant chatter of grossly incorrect information about their dear friend and teammate. But when the recruits boasting about him were  _this_  smug about their inaccurate accounts? As a simple Galra with a passion for historical accuracy, it bothered Adwru to no end. For Nihaar, it was just fun teasing the new recruits about the ridiculousness of their accounts.

“Maybe to newbies like  _you three_ ,” Nihaar smirked.

“But to  _other_  Commanders such as the two of us? Whom have fought beside him on missions when we were just as kitten-brained as you lot? He’s simply Keith to us,” Adwru added pointedly. Bopud seemed to wilt at the jab, his ego deflated enough that Adwru felt a conversation may still be had. “Keith is far from some lonely renegade. At least, not so much anymore.”

“Yeah, he has a mate and a few kits and is really happy with his life on his home planet!” The other Commander agreed happily.

Ahcom blinked in surprise. “Really? I’ve never heard anyone mention that before,” They said.

“Because  _no one_  has been able to hold his attention long enough to _become_  his mate! He  _never_  talks about having a family because he  _doesn’t_  have one! Ugh, you two are  _just_  trying to screw with us!” Gultat snapped.

“His mate is the Green Paladin of Voltron. They met and fell in love as they worked together to free the galaxy; both when he was with Team Voltron and once he joined us here. They like to try and keep their family life and professional working relationship separate though,” Nihaar explained bluntly. Ahcom let out a quiet  _aww_ and she laughed lightly at the younger Galran’s delight. “They’re totally smitten with one another, too. It’s kinda ridiculous when you see them together.”

Adwru shrugged a bit. “And in regards to it not being mentioned? He doesn’t talk much about his personal life unless you know what questions to ask. He can go on for days about how great his kits are or how intelligent his mate is,” He said.

“So… He  _isn’t_  a complete bad ass?” Bopud asked uncertainly.

“No, he’s still a bad ass; just not exactly an isolated, cold one. He can come off as cold or snobby to those that don’t know him, but he’s a big sweetheart underneath it all,” Nihaar agreed.

Gultat opened his mouth to say something when the door to the small conference room slid open. Three little blurs darted in and crowded over to Keith, a trio chanting, “Daddy!” His eyes lit up and a huge smile split across his face, one that was soft and affectionate as he knelt down to pull all three into his arms.

“There are my little trouble makers! Were you three good for your Mom?” He beamed, glancing briefly up at the other figures filing in. A pretty female Earthing in a light green tank top and a pair knee-length shorts walked over, looking thoroughly amused as she tied her hair back into a ponytail.

“I plead the Fifth on this question!” One of the three said, raising his hand.

“Oh, of course you would, Newt,” The female laughed, ruffling the mop of dark curls belonging to the child in question. Several other figures walked in behind her, dressed similarly to her, that the three recruits recognized as the other members of Team Voltron.

Keith chuckled and scooped the youngest of them up, a tiny thing with the same tawny locks as their mother, and pressed a kiss to her forehead. “How was the flight out here? I mean, I’m sure it was a little scary since it was yout first time flying in space, Aria,” He mused, settling the tiny tot on her hip and gently combed one hand through her hair.

The little one, called Aria, wrapped her arms around his neck. “It was scary at first because of all the shaking! But Mommy stayed with me and Kaden held my hand. Newt was a jerk about it, though!” She declared.

Newt, a dark haired boy with large bronze-tinted eyes, jolted to attention. “You’re such a tattle tail!” He whined.

“It’s not tattling if it’s the truth,” Kaden, the tallest whom resembled Keith the most, chimed in. He looked up at his Dad with a small scowl. “He kept pretending the the turbulence was enemy fire and making her cry.”

“You’re  _both_  no fun!” Newt wailed in protest.

“Doesn’t have a mate and kits, right?” Nihaar beamed and shoved up from her seat. She then waved as she started to dart over, tail up high and flicking from side to side excitedly. “Pidge! It’s been so long since I’ve seen you! And look at how big you three are getting!” She said, darting over to greet her friend’s family.

Adwru smirked at the gobsmacked expressions on all three of the trainees’ faces. “I tried to tell you. Sometimes your conceptions aren’t always right,” He said before picking up the screen and heading over to discuss the training plan with the Paladins. Years ago, Keith Kogane had been a loner looking for a place to call home. He had found that with the feisty Pidge Gunderson, the two growing up and growing together and fostering a healthy and happy family. None of this changed either of their accomplishments, though; only proved that everyone could find their happiness.


	8. Library - NSFW

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> NSFW. Libraries are typically meant to be a quiet place to get work done or study. However, sometimes the subject you’re studying can be stressful and you need a little break.

Kolivan had suggested that the private library of the Blade of Marmora would be a good place for Pidge to begin with her research. The Galra usage and harvesting of quintessence have always been somewhat interesting to her, but the research on the Castle of Lions was scarce and glitch after so many years. Aside from that, Honerva’s research had been conducted almost solely on Daibazaal, so it made sense that the Galra would be the ones most likely to have access to her notes and reports. Kolivan had extended the offer after their latest mission when she had made some comment about the way the Robeast they’d had to fight seemed to be using a toxic gas made of quintessence to try and help it defeat Voltron. “We have about seventy percent of the research notes that Empress Honerva kept throughout her years of research. We also have several independent research studies conducted by other Empire scientists and Blade scientists that may help yield some results. I take it you have a program that can translate it, so you’re more than welcome to come see what we have to offer,” He had said calmly.

And Pidge, thrilled at having access to additional research materials, had jumped at the chance.

Keith had agreed to help her out with navigating the place, as he’d been through it a few times himself. “I was a little curiously about some Galran lore so I checked out some of the things they had around here. Pretty interesting stuff,” He said as they walked in. The library was different than what she had been expecting, to say the least. While there was the expected labyrinth of bookcases, there were several small rooms with tinted glass doors on the opposite door. She only realized they were rooms due to someone using a key card to open a door and revealing a small study area inside. Keith followed her gaze and chuckled. “You aren’t going to have to hack into one of those rooms; I have access.”

She perked up and grinned at him impishly. “I figured you did, otherwise you wouldn’t know this place that well,” She retorted, perking up when she noticed a Blade member with an eye patches over two of their three eyes glaring at them. She waved one hand meekly, hoping it translated to an apology, and they seemed satisfied with it. She then scowled up at the quietly snickering boy beside her, making sure one of her pointy elbows connected with his side. “Thanks for the warning. Jerk.” She made sure to mouth what she was saying instead of actually using her voice.

“It’s a library; I figured you knew what to expect,” He mouthed back, rubbing his side where she’d clipped him but seeming still amused. She huffed and gave him a small shove, indicating he lead her towards what she was looking for. She collected a large stack of books – which she made him carry – before they headed into a room and got started on the research. She had been admittedly impressed with the decently sized four-seater table inside along with a small shelf built in to the wall on one side for additional storage. She had Keith place the books there, fished out her laptop, picked the first two she thought would be good, and they started in on the research.

They made it through three hours before Pidge grew irritated and threw herself on top of the table with a low groan. Keith paused in jotting down a few sequences she’d highlighted into a notebook she’d given him and peered over her. “Are you okay?” He whispered.

“No. I’m dead. I can’t believe Pidge Gunderson is fucking dead,” She grumbled back, voice partially muffled by her arm and the table. She glared out through the darkened glass of the study room, watching the silhouettes of other Blade members as they flounced on by. She had been a bit curious as to how much the tinting actually did for the rooms and been impressed when Keith informed her that, despite looking like the tinting wasn’t that heavy, it completely blocked out the main portion of the library. The shapes of other people moving around could be seen from inside the room, but nothing more, and anyone looking in from the out would be left in the dark, so to speak.

Keith tapped her shoulder to get her attention. “Want to take a break?” He whispered, setting his pen in the spirals of his notebook and moving it off to the side.

She frowned and leaned her head back against the table, teetering from side to side by her chin. “We can’t put reserves on rooms in here, can we?”

“No,” He said calmly, moving the books they’d been looking through to the shelf with the others and setting his notebook on top.

“So if we left we could potentially lose out on having a room. And I doubt we’d be allowed to take such high-profile tomes back to your room?”

“No books are allowed to leave the library, actually; regardless of their subject material. They have a small children’s book section and those books aren’t allowed to leave, either,” She blinked then looked up at him incredulously. He held up his hands and shrugged. “Don’t ask me, I just work here.”

She rolled her eyes but chuckled a bit at his response. She appreciated his dry wit more than she told him, not wanting him to get an ego about it or anything. “Then I’m gonna have to pass on a break. I don’t want to lose dibs on a room,”

“I never said that it was a break that required us to leave,” He mused as he settled behind her seat, one hand resting on the table and the other on the back of her chair. She scowled for a moment before seeming to catch up on what he was putting down.

“Oh, that seems like a terrible idea,” She mumbled, more to try and convince herself out of it than him. The walls of the room weren’t transparent, so there was no risk of being seen. And the doors only unlocked when the card used to open them was swiped from the inside, so there was no risk of anyone walking in on them either. Honestly, it was more an issue of volume control, then. Which could potentially be a probably because Pidge tended to be on the loud side. Then again… “Let’s do it.” She carefully pushed up from her seat, grin widening as he pulled her chair out as she stood.

He chuckled a bit moving one hand from the back of the chair to settle on her hip as she turned to fully face him. “I had a hunch that you’d be down, you freak,” He teased, pressing a small kiss to her temple.

“Hey, you’re the one that suggested it. So what does that say about you, buster?” She grinned, turning around to face him.

“That I spend too much time with you,” He mused, taking the chance to nip lightly at her earlobe. She couldn’t particularly remember ever suggesting something like this, but she also wasn’t willing to put it past herself, either. Then, with one easy move, he looped his arm around her waist and hoisted her up on the table.

“So what do you have in mind for me, oh naughty one?” She teased lightly, moving one hand to tease along the collar of his new jacket. His original jacket – which was now hers – had gotten too small for him and he’d needed a replacement. This one was similar to the old on in that it was made of leather, but it was mostly red with white stripes right above the cuffs and a white collar. The new one had been a team effort for his birthday a year ago and he seemed to really love it, which she was glad for. She thought he looked good in it.

He smirked at her and hummed thoughtfully. “I guess you’ll have to wait and see, huh?” He mouthed back before leaning down to kiss her. She kissed back eagerly and slipped one hand around his neck to try and get a bit better leverage to pull herself up closer to him. One of his hands slid down to start working the fly of her jeans open while the other slid up the front of her shirt to work at the clasp of her bra.

Pidge had developed a soft spot for front-clasping bras, due to them being easier to reach and unlatch. Also, for the sake of convenience.

He pushed her shirt up just far enough so that he could get a look at the opened bra and chuckled a bit, leaning down to press a small kiss above her left breast. She’d worn the red peppermint striped bra he’d commented on thinking would be cute on her in a catalog a while back. “Did you get the full set?” He mumbled against her skin, the words translating more through feel than actual audio.

“Guess you’ll have to find out, huh?” She giggled quietly, winking at him.

He smiled up at her as his fingers popped open the button and started to get the zipper down. Pidge decided to be nice and lifted her hips to help him shimmy them down. He only tugged one of her legs free, which she found to be lazy but also practical, and hummed appreciatively at the sight that greeted him. The panties were identical to the bra, including even the light trim of lace along the top and ends. Despite finding them charming, Keith didn’t let them stay up much longer before he was tugging them down to join her jeans dangling off one ankle. He carefully pulled the chair back over with one foot, settled in, and tugged her a bit closer to her the edge of the table.

And then, with only a smug smirk as warning, his mouth was on her.

She let out a small squeak of surprise but relaxed almost immediately with a pleased purr. She leaned back on one hand while the other shifted to curl in his hair, giving an encouraging tug. He hummed lightly as he traced her clit with the tip of his tongue, his hands giving her thighs a small squeeze in response. He shifted a bit closer so that her legs could rest more comfortably on his shoulders, her knees hooking up against them, and his hands moved from her thighs One hand joined his mouth in teasing strokes along her clit and entrance while the other slid up higher, trailing in an almost tickling manner across her stomach to lightly palm at one breast. She moaned louder and tugged harder, trying to rock her hips into his mouth a bit better but finding a bit difficult with the angle.

“Ah, fuck, Keith,” She groaned out, arching her back in hopes of getting a bit more friction. Her breast pushed more firmly into his hand, the calloused skin brushing against her nipple in all the best ways as he slowly groped. His other hand down lower began to make slow circles, holding her clit not-quite-tight-enough between his index and middle fingers. Meanwhile, his tongue had begun to lap at the juices flowing from her entrance, pushing slowly in with each lap. “Yeah, like that! You’re so good to me!” She whined loudly. He suddenly shifted away a little, his hand on her breast moving to rest on her stomach leaning back a bit in the seat so his head was closer to her knees. He looked up at her, indigo eyes sparking in dark mirth, as he licked his lips then held one finger in front of them in warning. She gawked at him for a minute – and briefly toyed with the idea of pulling on his hair harder – before huffing quietly and nodding. This seemed to placate him and he dove back down, resuming his actions.

He would start to build up to going faster and harder, but every time she started to get too loud, he’d pulling back and start all over again.

The thing about Pidge, as both she and Keith had learned throughout their relationship, was that she tended to be vocal. The only times she was quiet during sex were if she wasn’t enjoying it – which had only happened a handful of times and been huge blows to his ego – or if she was really tired, because sometimes she enjoyed sleepy, snugly half-awake sex. But that wasn’t much of an issue because, luckily for her, Keith tended to be an early riser, so on the occasions where they got to share a living space he’d be a bit more alert and eager to give in to her demands. However, her being loud was significantly important because it was a good way to gauge how close she was to orgasm; the louder she got, the closer she was.

She was aware of this fact. Keith was aware of this fact, the asshole. And he was using that fact paired with their location to deny her time and time again.

“Keith, I swear to  _whatever_  higher power you believe in,” She wheezed after the fourth consecutive denial, making sure to keep her volume down, “that if you  _don’t quit it_  with the games, I  _will_  make you pay.”

He peered up and her then shifted again, moving to lean over her. She pulled him down by his hair for a kiss, a little damp and hostile, and felt pride swell at the low groan he released. Yeah, he wasn’t the only one that could use leverage to get what they wanted in this little game between them. When they pulled back he seemed to consider her words. “Think you can stay quiet?” He asked.

“I can stay quiet  _just fine_  if you stop messing around!” She growled lowly in warning, trying her best for an intimidating glare. He gave her a quick peck before pulling back a bit to start opening his jeans. Evidently he recalled that Pidge would be just as big of a tease as he was and she, unlike him, was better prepared; she’d brought a couple of their toys along in her bag for the weekend. She smirked as she pushed herself more upright, intending to shove him into the chair and ride him for all he was worth.

Instead, she moved her on to her side in one fluid motion, moving one leg from her shoulders but leaving the other where it was. She was grateful, suddenly, for how flexible she was. “Is this okay?” He mouthed, tapping the knee on his shoulders to get her attention.

She smiled, touched by the question. He was always thoughtful in the strangest of ways and strangest of times, but it was part of why she liked him. She nodded in lieu of using her words, letting her eyes trail down as she watched one of his hands move down to pump at his cock to get himself further prepared before lining up. She let one of her arms rest along her side and the other stayed on the table, palm flat so she could try and gain some leverage if she decided that she wanted to.

He pushed in with one steady and punctuated thrust that had her tensing and gasping, head tipping back a bit.  _Oh_ , she  _liked_  this angle. He could get  _deep_  like this. She quickly mover the arm that had been idle along her side to press the hand to her mouth, hoping to muffle the sound as much as possible. Keith paused for a moment, both as he settled to being fully inside but also to watch her reaction. She glared at him, keeping her hand in place, and tried to rut against him as an indication that he keep going.

He smiled, tilted his head to give her a small warning kiss, before he started going to town. She barely managed to muffle the sharp cry he warranted from her, biting her lip as well to try and help keep the sounds down. This, she realized, was what he’d been trying to build up to. He wanted to get so worked up and needy that she wouldn’t be able to keep her voice down. And then he could edge her on even further.

Two could play at that angle though.

He had one hand settled on her hip to keep her placed against the table so he could thrust while the other had moved back to toy with one of her breasts. Instead, she moved her hand away from her mouth, grabbed his wrist and yanked it towards her. She calmly tugged two of his fingers into her mouth, letting out a quiet purr as she did. His eyes widened in surprise and he paused briefly in his thrusting. She suckled lightly and then swirled her tongue along the tips of his fingers, much like she did when she had her mouth on other places.

That seemed to spark a competitive edge inside of him. His thrusting picked up more gusto and he moved his other hand down to roll her clit between his thumb and index finger in time with his thrusts. Pidge inhaled through her nose and kept her voice at nothing more than high-pitched mewls, continuing to lap at his fingers in her mouth like she did when she sucked his cock, letting her actions become a mirror of his.

She came first, between all the teasing leading up to it, and Keith followed with a few short, rabbit thrusts after her.

Keith rebounded from his orgasm first, watching her for a moment with a contented smile. He carefully slid her leg of his shoulder and scooped her up in his arms, cradling her sideways against him as she caught her breath. One of his hands lightly stroked along the top of one thigh with the other stroked up her side, from hip to the base of her rib cage and then back down again. He peppered little kisses against her jaw and shoulder that were facing him, chuckling quietly when she tilted her head to steal a kiss.

She shifted carefully, not wanting to make too big a mess, so that she was straddling him and looped both her arms around his neck. When they broke from that kiss he returned to the soft kisses, hands moving down to rub small circles on her hips. “I told you that I would take care of staying quiet,” She huffed, quiet and self-satisfied, in his ear.

He pressed a small, quick kiss to her lips. “You know what the best part about this was?” He mouthed with an amused grin.

“What?” She asked, lightly running her fingers through his sweaty hair and wondering what the showers on the Blade base were like.

“These rooms are not only tinted, but insulated,” He said, raising his voice to a normal speaking volume, “so they’re also soundproof.”

She stared at him in silence for a moment before getting a good fistful of hair and yanking backwards, suddenly grateful that he still liked having that stupid mullet of his.


	9. Swimming Lessons

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She tensed even more and sent him a glare, a faint pink hue misting along her cheeks. “O-Of course I do! I just don’t like to that much!” She snapped.

Alien resorts were always kinda fascinating to Keith.

Most of them were nothing like human resorts and had various strange room layouts to accommodate the various types of aliens that came in. Some rooms were insulated like iguana tanks, with heating laps and beds made of stone and the like, while others were rooms filled head to toe with water but the water was kept in place like a sheet of glass just inside the doorway. Finding places that had rooms with more “simplistic needs”, as the staff always liked to call it, was surprisingly hard to do, especially the farther from Earth they got. Very few other lifeforms from the Milky Way galaxy had made it that far out before, and the only other races that had required similar needs were either extinct or completely under Galra control.

This resort, thankfully enough, had rooms that would meet their needs. And they even had a pool and hot tub that were ground-based, unlike the others he’d encountered; both on and off the Castle Ship.

They’d ended up getting four rooms with two large beds in each one. Allura and Pidge were sharing one room, Lance and Hunk in another, Shiro and Coran in the third, and he was in the last room with Kolivan. They rest of the team was there to have fun and relax, but Kolivan was apparently meeting up with an informant of his in the next city over. “You may choose to stay here or come with me. I have no preference, really,” The older Galra had informed him calmly.

To Keith, they were spending the money on the fourth room anyway, so he may as well get some usage out of it. Pidge had tried to sneak in to join him the first night there, but Shiro had caught them and pinned them with the universe’s most disappointed look. The two had exchanged glances before Pidge had slumped her shoulders and made her way back down the three doors to she and Allura’s room. Keith had pinned Shiro with a glare and received an eye roll in response. It wasn’t even like he and Pidge were going to be doing anything inappropriate. They were just gonna hook her laptop up to the television-esque device in each room and watch pirated alien films for the night. Maybe order some room service and put it on the Blades tab. And, okay, if he was honest, they might do some snogging, but it would be the most respectful snogging that had ever taken place in a hotel bedroom!

The next day had been spent doing tourist things and seeing the sights as a big group, which had been fun. Pidge and Keith bought each other bumper stickers in alien languages they couldn’t read for their respective space rides. He and Lance had a race in what looked like a park but ended up being a hatching ground for the denizens offspring – which explained all the signs and railings around the place – and had only been let off with a warning because it wasn’t currently mating season and they were diplomats of the coalition. Hunk had actually been able to decipher which native cuisines were safe from them to eat due to his extensive research into the subject and a small device he’d built to assist with the process. He and Shiro had briefly wandered off to check out a small weaponry booth to see what kind of wares they had there. He, Coran and Allura had been the only ones interested in the art museum they visited but it had certainly been nice chatting with them about the pieces that either of them recognized and hearing the history behind them.

Kolivan rejoined them for dinner at what he could only call a seafood restaurant and then they headed back to the hotel with the plan of hitting the pool.

He and Lance had fist bumped wordlessly when they saw that it was an actual Earth-style pool, the both of them being so sick of the strange pools they’d encountered over their travels. There had been a pool he recalled that curved like a letter C in a wall; still didn’t know how that worked, exactly. The pool had been a more than gracious size – a bit bigger than a tennis court, as far as he could estimate – and seemed to go decently deep. Kolivan and Coran headed off to the hot tub while Hunk cannon-balled right into the center of the pool, effectively drenching Lance and Shiro in the process. Lance sputtered and glared at his friend, opening his mouth to respond, before Allura followed suit and splashed the duo with an even bigger current. “This is  _absolutely_  uncalled for!” Lance shrieked.

Allura resurfaced and shook her ehad a bit, the long braided whip of her hair moving slowly due to being weighed down. She flashed Lance a cheeky grin. “And what, do tell, are you planning to do about it?” She mused.

“Defend my honor,  _that’s_  what! Come on, Shiro, let’s team up for a game of Chicken to remind them whose who!”

“Oh, man, let’s do it!” Hunk said excitedly.

“Chicken? What kind of game is this?” Allura asked excitedly.

“Oh, it’s tons of fun! You’ll love it!” Hunk insisted as Lance rushed into the water, Shiro a few paces behind him.

Kolivan watched with a small scowl, leaning back against the wall of the hot tub with his arms up and stretched out along the rim. “Are they always this excitable?” He asked Coran calmly.

Coran flashed him a small smirk. “Oh, Kolie, my friend, you have  _no_  idea,” He mused happily.

Keith didn’t catch the rest of their conversation as he headed back over to the pool after dropping his stuff on the chair beside Pidge and Shiro’s. He carefully waded in up to his waist and hummed in surprise. The water wasn’t super warm, but a nice temperature that was easy to adapt to, unlike what he’d been expecting. A quick glance around showed Pidge seated on the edge not too far off with only her legs dipped in about halfway up her calf. He waded over to her, pausing briefly to glance over his shoulder at the loud startled shriek of a certain Yellow Paladin.

Allura was beaming at Shiro and Lance, whom both looked a little stunned, as she carefully adjusted her grip on Hunk’s legs as he wobbled a bit on her shoulders. “Certainly wasn’t expecting that to be the way they went about it,” He commented as he reached her, the water now reaching up to his upper arms. He reached up towards her with one hand with the other lightly stroked along her leg, going from her ankle to drip water up to her knee.

She laughed lightly and leaned back, propping herself up with one hand while the other met his, lacing the fingers and tracing the top of his hand with her thumb. “You’d be surprised at how competitive Allura can get. And besides, it’s probably better that she hold him up; I’d worry that Hunk would flake out just to make Lance look good,” She hummed.

“Can’t he still do that now?”

“Not as easily, no. If the base person has a good grip and stance, than the upper person can typically stay upright a lot better,” She said, watching as Hunk and Lance battled to knock the other off.

A quick back step from Allura sent Lance toppling forward while Hunk managed to stay upright, the two victors cackling in delight. “Rematch!” Lance declared as he resurfaced.

Keith chuckled and looked up at Pidge curiously. She was laughing at the spectacle of Lance trying to frantically climb back on Shiro’s shoulder while the other looked thoroughly done with being treated like a jungle gym. “Wanna get in on the action? Maybe show them what-for?” He asked with a sly grin.

She immediately tensed and shook her head. “Honestly, I’m more a fan of spectating in situations such as this,” She said, keeping her tone even. Her other hand, however, had moved to fiddle lightly with the little green bow on the left hip of her bikini bottom. He had noticed she would fidget if she wasn’t in a position to turn to her laptop instead when she was uneasy.

He cocked his head to the side a bit and hummed thoughtfully. She hadn’t seemed too terribly excited at the idea of going to the pool in the first place, once he stopped and thought about it. “Pidge, do you know how to swim?” He asked.

She tensed even more and sent him a glare, a faint pink hue misting along her cheeks. “O-Of course I do! I just don’t like to that much!” She snapped. The roars of water combat off to the side paused briefly, all eyes swiveling to them, and her flush darkened. “It’s nothing, guys! Keith’s just asking dumb questions!” She called.

“Doesn’t he always?” Lance called back right before Hunk very calmly yanked him to the right and send him tumbling back into the water. He surfaced and started splashing at Allura and Hunk frantically. “That was fighting dirty and you know!”

“All’s fair in love and war, buddy!” Hunk laughed back happily, their playful bout resuming easily.

He turned his attention back to his now quietly fuming girlfriend and pushed up a bit, keeping himself held up with one hand while the other moved to carefully tilt her head to look at him again. “Hey, it’s okay if you aren’t the best swimmer. I have an idea so that you can enjoy a bit more of the water without worrying so much about the actual swimming part of it,” He offered.

“Oh yeah? And what’s this brilliant idea?” She asked, still pouting a bit.

He smiled and slid back into the pool and held his arms out to her. “Here, I’ll help you get in and show you,” He said gently. She still looked a bit skeptical, but slowly shimmied her way closer. Once she was close enough, he gently took her hips and helped to lower her in. He didn’t let go, though, and she cautiously wrapped her arms around his neck. He beamed at her and slowly started moving along to the deeper ends, looping one arm more snugly around her waist while the other drew little symbols along her back. “See? Not so bad, huh?” He asked curiously.

She tightened her grip around his neck, the larger bow in the center of the top half of her bikini pressing lightly into his chest. “I guess not,” She mumbled quietly. He stayed close to the edges, just to avoid the ruckus of the others and also to assure that Pidge could be very easily hoisted back out if she chose to. Instead she leaned her head on his shoulder. “So where did you come up with this idea from?” She asked.

“My grandma. This was how she taught me how to swim,” He said gently. The loose upwards strands of a haphazard bun she’d tossed her hair into were grazing his chin and it made him chuckle a bit. “I spent a lot of time with her at her apartment when I was young, since she was an accountant and could do her work from home. It was easier than my dad trying to figure out childcare and my mom wasn’t around. On nights where I stayed over night and it wasn’t too cold out, she’d take me to the pool in the evening after dinner if I ate all my veggies. I’m pretty sure she paid off the apartment security because I know for a fact we’d be in their past the hours it was supposed to be open for. I always liked those nights, though, because she would let me learn at my own pace and sometimes she’d swim with me facing the sky and teach me about the stars.”

Pidge giggled a little bit. “Ah, so Grannie Kogane was the one that put the wanderlust in you, huh?” She teased.

He chuckled a bit and hummed. “Yeah, I guess she kinda did,” He mused softly.

“Afraid to say there weren’t a lot of pools where I grew up. I mean, there were families that had pools since we lived in the desert, but my parents never saw a point in having one installed in the backyard. And Matt and I weren’t really all that interested in the athletic stuff, either, so it seemed kinda pointless. I took a couple basic classes at the local YMCA, but I didn’t really like being outside and my parents didn’t really want to push me,” She explained.

He hummed and tightened his hold on her a bit as they descended another foot in depth. “Not like it would have done much. You aren’t very good at doing what you’re told,” He said playfully.

She looked up at him and stuck her tongue out in a show of defiance. “Like you’re one to talk, Mr. I-Punched-Iverson-Because-He-Was-Talking-Shit,”

“Talk shit, get hit, as you always like to say,” He laughed back. That earned him a laugh from her, too, and he smiled at being able to breath and enjoy the simple chatter between them.


	10. Tickle Torture

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some days, Keith just wants to sit around and do nothing. Too bad he planned his most recent veg-out on the quad-annual house-cleaning day and his wife isn’t one to play fair when she wants him to do something.

“Hey, Keith,” She said, her tone drawling out his name slowly, propped between the door and the doorway by one hip. He glanced at her briefly over the book he was reading, then looked back down and released a low hum of acknowledgment. “Aren’t you supposed to be helping with the house work? Specifically helping with some of the higher up places?” Once every two or three months – depending on the season, admittedly – they did a full clean-up of the house. During the fall they’d also typically try to hold a garage sale to get rid of things they weren’t using, too.

“I was just taking a quick break,” He said with a small shrug.

“You’ve been here for at least an hour,” She said bluntly.

“I may have taken my lunch break as well as a couple smoke breaks,” He mused lightly, chuckling a bit to himself. Another glance upward showed Pidge staring at him like he’d just tried to tell her that the sky was pink and clouds were made of candy. He had to admit that the bandanna she’d put on to cover the top of her head added a cute touch to the expression. “Just given me another five to ten minutes more and then I’ll come back out to help.”

A light sparked in her eyes and the grin she flashed him screamed of retaliation.

“See, I had a hunch you’d say that,” She mused, pushing off the doorway and placing one hand against the door, “so I brought reinforcements with me.” With one light shove, the door pushed open the rest of the way and three little figures were rushing for him with excited battle cries.

Keith froze, a bit too stunned at the underhanded tactics on display, and was unable to do anything as all three launched at him with wiggling fingers. He howled his lament as tiny fingers prodded at his stomach, gently pinched the little divot between his shoulders and neck, some even daring to try for his armpits. “Mercy! Mercy!” He cackled, trying to roll and squirm away. Instead, once he made it to his belly, the oldest sat on his back with a smug bark of laughter, leaving him prone and completely at their mercy.

“Good job, kids! Remember that the back of his knees are ticklish, too!” Pidge sang happily, arms crossed over her chest. She was a clever woman, that wife of his, but two could play at that game.

“Kaden, my son,” He wheezed out quietly, trying to remain quiet to avoid Pidge catching wind of what they were planning.

The young boy in question leaned over, his grin still in place. “Mom said that if you wet the bed you have to clean it up,” He said calmly.

“How much- Ah-ha! Newt, knock it off! - is she paying you for this?” He gasped, cutting off briefly at the small and light pinches being given to the backs of his knees. It took a lot of his self-control to not jerk his leg at the action and risk kicking one of the three children in the face. He was fine with them having a good time but he also hated the idea of hurting one of his babies; regardless of it being intentional or not.

Kaden’s eyes narrowed suspiciously and he leaned a bit closer. “Are you saying you want to offer us something better?” He asked, discretely waving one hand behind him. It seemed to be some kind of sign to Newt and Aria that they slow down just a little bit. Apparently he had considered that negotiations could be made.

Too smart for his own dang good, Keith realized.

“I can promise you each an extra scoop of ice cream with your desserts for a week if you go turn-coat on her,” He said quietly.

One dark brow quirked in intrigue. “The rookies here have a soft place in them for chocolate syrup. What’s your policy in regards to that?”

“I’ll do you one better; I’ll get that chocolate freezing sauce that forms a shell over the ice cream,” Keith said, his tone as serious as it had been issuing orders back in his Paladin days. Indigo eyes that were identical to his own widened with excitement before a small smirk split on his son’s face.

“Better deal than what we were originally offered,” He mused, leaning back a bit to motion his siblings over. The three whispered in a quiet huddle and he could hear Pidge giggling by the door. She probably thought they were discussing what angle to attack him from next. After a moment, Newt and Aria carefully scuffled off of the bed and Kaden gently pat Keith’s head. “You run a hard bargain, my friend, but we’ve decided to take you up on the offer.”

“Wait, what? What’s this all about?” Pidge asked suspiciously.

“We’ve been made a better offer, you see,” Newt said with a grin.

“It’s nothing personal, though! We still love you, Mommy!” Aria insisted with a shy smile of her own.

Kaden hopped off the bed, standing between his siblings. “It’s just that Dad really knows how to stack the deck to sweeten the deal,”

“Literally,” Keith smirked, pushing himself on to his knees and getting off the bed. He glanced down at his children briefly before grinning at the baffled look on Pidge’s face. “Now, kids, why don’t we give Mommy a taste of her own medicine?” He suggested.

Catching on to what had happened, Pidge turned on her heel and made a mad dash back down the hallway. The children tore after her with another thunderous shout and he followed along at a light jog, eager to see the show regardless of how far in the doghouse he’d be later.


	11. Fast Food

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Space can be a really strange place filled with great things to see and experience. Sometimes, though, it’s nice to get a little taste of something a bit more familiar. Mention of Lanlura; can be read as platonic or romantic.

He never understood how she knew when he needed her despite the many miles between them, but he was grateful for it regardless.

The last few days have been rather brutal on him, to say the least. He’d been on assignment for an assassination with another Blade member. Their target was a high-ranking Galra commander that had – according to their sources – developed a weapon that could potentially take mental control of the Lions of Voltron. He had been planning to test it out mere hours before Keith and Yutrilo, the other Blade, snuck on to base to take him out. And they had been successful, but Yutrilo had been seriously injured during their attempt to flee. Keith, frantic to save his teammate, had dragged the older Blade along on to the ship and raced them back to the safety of the Blade base. Kolivan read him the riot act for – yet again – going against his training and nearly compromising the both of them in going back for Yutrilo. Yutrilo themselves had also lost their mind at him when he’d gone to check at them, accusing him of selfishly denying them the honor of dying on the front line against the Galra Empire.

Needless to say, he had stormed off to his room after those confrontations.

She’d shown up seemingly out of no where, sending him a message on the private phone-like communicator she’d built for the whole team to use. Despite him being with the Blade, she’d still shoved the device into his hands at a diplomatic meeting, insisting he keep it. “Just because you’re a part of their team,” She said, cocking her head to indicate Kolivan talking to Shiro and Allura a few feet away, “doesn’t mean you aren’t still a part of our team.” He’d been touched, really, at the gesture and smiled shyly as he stroked the red Voltron symbol engraved on the back.

“Thanks, Pidge. I really appreciate it,” He had said, voice a little choked up form sincerity. She had beamed at his response, gave his shoulder a reassuring squeeze, and then been dragged away by Matt to help him debate something about properly translating Galra files with Hunk.

He’d just barely changed from his Blade uniform when his communicator chimed. He was greeted with a message that simply read, “Get in loser; we’re going shopping.”

A quick glance outside revealed Green Lion’s snout pressed up against his window, partially open in preparation for his entrance. He stared before letting out a long, drawn-out sigh. “No way you’re taking no for an answer, huh?” He mumbled, grabbing his jacket from his cot and climbing out, making sure to close it again once he was out. He climbed in easily and scrambled up into the cockpit.

“What’s up, nerd?” She asked, peering at him over her shoulder with a huge, smug grin on her lips.

He draped one arm along the back of the pilot’s chair as she pulled back, moving away from the base and starting off for wherever she had in mind. “Another day, another mission,” He said, keeping his tone casual and ambivalent.

“Nothing interesting happened? Normally you have crazy stories about alien tech and intense bouts of fisticuffs to tell me about,” She asked with a skeptical raise of an eyebrow.

“Not this time,” He snapped, glaring at her a bit and tensing visibly. She stared at him for a moment before he seemed to realize how he acted and turned away, fingers digging into the side of the pilot’s chair. “Anyway, what’s on the agenda for tonight?”

She stared at him for another moment before turning her attention to the throttle and monitors. She clacked and clicked away at one of the screens for a moment. “That’s a surprise,” She said lightly. An awkward silence settled over them for the fifteen minutes it took to reach a decently-sized asteroid that housed the place; Keith embarrassed about lashing out at her and Pidge more wanting to avoid setting him off again. She perked up and grinned as the large, neon planet sign came in to view. “Ah, we have arrived!”

Keith blinked, staring at the huge sign of what appeared to be a burger with three neon rings surrounding it and the name of the establishment – that he swore was somehow in Comic Sans font – they were gliding past. “Area 51 Burgers and Fries?” He asked, not sure if he believed what he was reading.

“Yup! It’s a fast food place that serves ‘traditional Earthling delicacies’, as they explain it! See, we went back to the space mall a couple of times, and me and Lance hit up the Earth-themed store there to see if they had anything new. And I asked the guy running the place if any of the aliens that were going to Earth to get this stuff had tried Earth food and he told us about this place! Said that they based it around Area 51 because they thought the idea of having an entire military section dedicated to hiding evidence of other life in the stars was hilarious,” She explained excitedly as she whirled Green around to the far end of the parking lot. There were trees he assumed to be fake that resembled oaks lining where the parking ended, with a huge empty space behind it. Pidge landed Green in the small clearing, having her lie down instead of sit so she’d be better covered. “Okay, Greenie, be a good girl while we get some grub!” She said happily as she stood up, giving the control panel an affectionate pat.

Green rumbled quietly in agreement and lowered her head a bit to make getting out easier on them.

The closer they got, Keith realized that the place was decorated like a 50’s style diner, which got a low, impressed whistle from Pidge. “Oh, wow, it looks like Sock Hop!” She beamed.

“What?” Keith asked, a bit baffled.

“Sock Hop! It was this old, classic restaurant that my grandparents would take Matt and me to a lot when we were younger,” She explained with a little grin as she tugged open the glass door. She held it as he slipped in beside her, starting to smile at the sheer force of her enthusiasm. “See, my dad’s parents lived in North Carolina and every summer my parents would have us go and spend about two months up there visiting with them. Every Monday morning and Friday evening, they’d take us there for breakfast and dinner. Papa Toni would give us each a dollar in quarters and let us take turns picking songs on the little jukebox on the table! And if we ate all of our food then they’d get us malts!”

“Sounds like it was tons of fun,” He said with a chuckle, looking around and blinking a bit in surprise. There was a long bar near the cash register, functioning as a barrier between the main floor of the restaurant and the work area for servers and cooks. The seats were made of sparkling red vinyl and looked like they were either recently reupholstered or had just been really well maintained. The tabletops were an almost-white color with little speckles of blue in them.

The employee that greeted them was a bubbly alien wearing a brown wig styled in a bob that covered one of her two sets of eyes. The brown wig looked a bit strange against the ashy gray of her skin but not in a necessarily unpleasant way. Her outfit even fit in with the themes of the time; simple white blouse, pink scarf looped in the collar of the blouse, a pink poodle skirt but the poodle had three heads instead of one. “Hello, lovelies! How are you doing tonight?” She asked eagerly.

“Pretty good, how about you?” Pidge asked politely as the other grabbed two menus from the podium just off to the side of the entrance.

“I am doing pretty fantastic, thank you so much for asking! Just the two of you tonight?”

“Yup!” Pidge grinned and grabbed his arm, tugging him to stand closer to her.

“Aw, a date! How sweet is that?” She beamed, pressing one of her three fingered hands to her cheek, just below a set of slits that Keith assumed were how her race breathed. “Well, my name is Ku’Matre, and I’ll be taking care of you both tonight! feel Follow me, please.” She gestured and began leading them through the main floor, seeking out a booth for the two of them. “You two don’t seem too familiar to me. You new to the parts?”

“Oh, we’re usually traveling around from here to there,” Keith said politely.

Pidge hummed in agreement. “We decided to come here to get a taste of home. We’re actually from Earth,” She added as Ku’Matre stopped and politely indicated a clean booth along the large windows of the restaurant. They slid into the booth, settling across from each other.

That caused Ku’Matre to gasp in awe. “Oh, my goodness, you are? Well if this isn’t the coolest thing to happen to me, I don’t know what is!” She gushed excitedly. Normally aliens were hostile towards them for being outsiders to the deeper parts of space – unless they were in the Lions or their Paladin armor when introduced, anyway – so it was kind of refreshing to meet one that thought it was exciting to meet what was an alien race to them. Especially since, to Keith and he knew Pidge, too, it was always cool getting to meet other races and learn about their cultures and traditions. Seeming to put her excitement aside for a moment or two, Ku’Matre gently set their menus down in front of them. “Anyway, here’s those menus for you. Tonight’s special is a loaf of meat slice with potatoes that have been mashed and cauliflower that has been steamed. I’ll be back in just a sec to take your drink orders, okay?” She beamed happily, turning each menu over to the front and indicating the small “Beverages” section in the top corner.

“Thank you so much, Ku’Matre,” Pidge said with a sincere smile. The server giggled and nodded her head politely before scampering off towards the back. Keith peered briefly over his shoulder to see their server gushing excitedly to the rest of the staff in hushed tones, indicating their table with a nod of her head so sharp it nearly dislodged her wig. He turned around before all eyes swiveled to the table and they saw him gawking back at them.

He turned his attention to the menu, humming in surprise and delight as he skimmed through. “Oh, wow, they have  _actual_  Coca-Cola products here. Oh, and deep-friend mushrooms!” He said, feeling his own excitement starting to kick up.

“We can get an order of those to start, if you want,” She offered, glancing briefly at him as she pulled something  from the other end of the table towards herself. She grinned widely and laughed as she held the small jukebox up in delight. “Would you look at  _this_! They really went all out with this thing; it looks like it actually works and accepts their equivalent of quarters!” She set the device down and rummaged through the pocket of her jeans to produce eight large, pale yellow coins. “You want first choice?” She offered.

He waved one hand and instead turned the page of his menu to look at the full entrees. “You can go first,” He said before taking in a sharp breath, “Pidge, they have a  _patty melt_  here! Do you _know_  how long it’s been since I’ve had an honest-to-goodness patty melt?” He was almost moaning in delight at the thought.

She giggled at him as she picked up a coin and started to shuffle through the song selections, clicking the button to go from page to page. “Oh, they have The Penguins version of Earth Angel! Such good tastes!” She beamed before dropping in her coin and clicking in the required combination. It took a second, but the little jukebox started up after a moment and she was practically glowing with her satisfaction. “Lance came here with Allura a while back since she was curious about Earth food. I don’t know what he got but he said it all tasted like the genuine article, so my hopes are pretty high for this place,” She said as she set the jukebox back at the other end of the table and looking back down at her menu. He perked up in surprise, brow knitting a bit in confusion, but waited to say anything else as Ku’Matre returned to take their drink order; a Coke for him and a Dr. Pepper for her. They also put in for the deep-fried mushrooms but Pidge needed more time to choose what else she wanted.

Once Ku’Matre had dropped off their drinks and taken their meal orders – Keith going with the patty melt with a side of sweet potato fries and Pidge picking a grilled chicken sandwich with a side of onion rings – and Pidge’s song ended, he picked up the jukebox and a coin. He shuffled through briefly before selecting Jailhouse Rock since it was the only track he recognized. Once it started, he set the jukebox back at the other end of the table and looked up at Pidge suspiciously. “How long have you known about this place?” He asked curiously, setting his crossed arms on the table and leaning on it lightly.

She stirred her drink idly with her straw, the ice clinking together quietly, and took a sip before answering. “Probably about… Three, maybe four months?”

He stared in surprise. “And you’ve been waiting all this time to check this place out?”

“Yeah. So?” She asked with a small laugh.

“Why? Why did you wait so long?”

“Because,” She said with a small, almost shy laugh, “I wanted to come here with  _you_. I mean, I thought I’d have the most fun getting to experience this with you.”

Ku’Matre appeared with their deep-fried mushrooms just then, a small dish with ranch at the center of the tray. She set it in the middle of the table and scampered off with a promise to being a second dish of sauce for them. Keith stared at the food for a moment before looking back up at Pidge, a small smile turning up on his lips. “Thanks, Pidge,” He said quietly.

She smiled back immediately. “Someone’s gotta make sure your scrawny tail is kept up to date with all of Team Voltron’s most pertinent discoveries, right?” She mused, swiping a mushroom and tossing it in her mouth.

He laughed and nodded, grateful for her comfort. Even if the Blade didn’t approve of looking out for your own like he did, it felt good to be reminded that there were other’s that did. And that those same people would look out for him just as much as he looked out for them.


	12. Great Outdoors

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pidge has accepted that she was the Green Paladin, Guardian of Nature, but acceptance and delight are not synonymous with one another. Especially when fulfilling requests that seem like an agoraphobics worth night mare come true.

Pidge had a love-hate relationship with being the Green Paladin, Guardian of the Forests.

On the one hand, being a Paladin had been one of the best experiences of her life. She’d been given a chance to explore regions of the galaxy that Earth could only dream existed. She had proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that the Garrison had lied about what happened with the Kerberos mission and had required Lance and Hunk both to drag her away from Commander Iverson, whom had gone beet-red when she started her aggressive and manically gleeful assault on his character at the truth being revealed. She learned about all kinds of new technology from various races that, with a few modifications and repurposing on her part, became helpful devices to Team Voltron to use or devices that could be used to help with life back on Earth. Helping to liberate planets that had been controlled by the Galra stood to be her favorite aspect, admittedly, because there was something about freeing people from an abusive dictatorship that felt right. Meeting, befriending, falling for and entering a committed relationship Keith Kogane was a close second but she kept that card under wraps to avoid his ego getting boosted too much.

But that led back to the list of things about her position that she found to be on the grating side.

The planet they were currently on was called Derumanta, a planet filled with a thick jungle environment and a society of people that specifically worshiped the Green Lion and her Paladin. The planet was known to be home to extremely effective medicines and ointments that could help with healing the members of the members of the Coalition. The denizens had been eager to assist the subject of their worship when Pidge made the request upon their arrival, but had a request for Pidge in return. “Nothing big or risky, we promise! It is a simple cleansing ceremony that is typically completed by a priestess, but having the Goddess of Wisdom and Earth Magic partake would be such an honor! So long as this is acceptable to both the Goddess herself and you, Paladin of Black,” High Priestess Bulra, the leader of their Derumantanese people, had explained to Keith with frantic excitement.

Keith had looked at Pidge to his left. “Would you be okay with this?”

She shrugged. “Sure. What’s the worst that could happen?” She had laughed. And if Pidge knew now what, exactly, the ceremony entailed? She’d have been a bit more hesitant in her agreement. The ceremony, as it turned out, involved Pidge being stripped down to what she could only describe as glorified underwear, covered in painted designs with some kind of sweet nectar, and having to stand out in the chill of the forest for an entire night until sundown the following day getting eaten alive by insects. The insects, as High Priestess Bulra had explained, her a type of bug that sucked blood but then used that blood to help pollinate the planet life of the world, creating stronger lines and more powerful medicines depending on the quality of the blood used. They believed that Pidge’s blood, given her status, would create one of the most potent lines of planet life which would lead to extremely effective medicine.

Ultimately, the Derumantanese were pleased with how the night went and sent her back to the small suite she’d been assigned for her stay while they awaited the other leaders of the Coalitions arrival to discuss the terms of Derumanta joining them. High Priestess Bulra had given Pidge a small clay pot with a cork in the top. “It’s a balm to help with the bites. They’ll start to sting and itch in a short while after you wash off the vigu nectar, but this should help you avoid that. It’s also fast-drying, so you won’t have to worry about letting it set too terribly long before laying down,” She explained, gently patting her hands with one of her long, six-fingered hands.

“Thank you,” She said with a small smile, hoping it didn’t come off as completely forced. She then scampered off to the large, shimmering silver skeleton of a tower in the center of their village. It was like a large condo, with rooms for each of the Paladins to relax in and enjoy. It was rare that their visits to other planets got to be a bit on the more relaxing side of things.

There was a small elevator made using lumber and vines that had to be cranked and pulled, but thankfully a larger Derumantanese inside, whom used the pulley to take her up to her floor. The whole building was clearly made using some kind of clay or mud material, an earthy aroma flitting through the whole place. Once she slipped off the elevator in to the hallway of her floor, she groaned a bit.

She had been hoping that there was some kind of window-like object that kept things in and out, but there wasn’t. There were large oval-shaped windows at either end of the hall that allowed the cool air to waft in. There were thin flaps of fabric with symbols – this planet’s equivalent of numbers – stitched in the center to distinguish them from one another instead of real doors but at least there seemed to be real walls separating each unit from each other as well. She could hear the quiet rumblings of the other tenants as she moved, pausing only once she reached the room that she knew was hears. She could hear Lance and Hunk debating the merits of some trivial thing in one of the rooms beside her and sighed, pushing back the curtain and heading into her own.

She was surprised to see Keith, wearing nothing but his red boxers, stretched out on the cot-like bed with a book. He perked up and his eyes seemed to bug out a bit. “Uh, nice Slave Leia costume?” He asked uncertainly as he moved to sit up.

“Thanks,” She quipped, trying not to laugh and suddenly kicking herself for showing him all the Star Wars films. She headed towards a small room off-set the main room that she assumed was the bathroom, nearly tripping over a small table next to it. Inside was a large tub with a large metal bucket of some sort with a long hose connecting to a spout just beside the tub. There was what looked like a pale pink loofah and a few bottles of wash lined along the outer rim of the tub basin. She thumped her head lightly against wall and whined in the back of her throat. She shouldn’t have been expecting that this place would have an incredibly modern bathroom, but a girl could dream. At least they had a fully functional toilet and small built-in shelves with towels and wash clothes.

“What the Hell did they do to you?” He asked in mild disbelief, indicating the red bumps all along her exposed skin.

She let out a sharp bark of laughter and twisted one of the knobs to start filling the hanging tub with water. She then set the jar of ointment on the small counter of a sink. “Well, it involved my blood being used to pollinate the vegetation on the planet,” She said bluntly. She reached back to start tugging off the ties of her top and glanced back at him curiously. “Would you mind pulling out a fresh change of clothes for me while I try to wash up here? I need a long nap.”

“Of course,” He said gently before disappearing back into the main room. Pidge smiled a bit, grateful that he was there with her. She did wonder, as she ditched the clothes and stepped into the tub, what he’d done with his own room. She knew for a fact that the Derumantanese had offered each of them their own private quarters, so she had to wonder if Keith had simply explained that the two of them were in a different kind of relationship or had simply snuck into her room after their escort left them to their own devices.

She shrugged it off and pulled a small lever that dumped the opened a small shoot in the bottom of the bucket and dropped the water on her. Only to release a high-pitched series of swears because it was  _freezing cold_.

“Are you okay?” Keith called, voice on edge with concern.

“Damnit Keith, no having sex where we can all hear you!” Lance shouted from the other side of the wall, banging on it with one hand for added emphasis, while Pidge tried to keep from biting her tongue with her chattering teeth. She reached over and twisted the other knob, hoping to warm up at least a little bit. She should have checked it before she dumped it on herself, admittedly, but that didn’t make it any less frustrating.

“As if you even know what a woman having sex sounds like, Lance!” Keith barked back, irritated and fast approaching the bathroom.

That earned a small snort out of her while she could hear Hunk letting a low whistle at the burn. “Okay,  _listen here_ , you 80’s cliché bad boy-!” Lance started to snap back, voice cracking as he rose in octave from indignation.

“I’m trying to get cleaned up and dumped freezing water on myself!” Pidge cut in, preaching up to press a few damp locks of hair out of her face. She pulled the lever again to dump the water on herself and bit the inside of her cheek, another flood of frigid water washing over her. If the water was cold regardless, what was the purpose behind having  _two damn knobs_? “I’m fine, Keith, I’ll be out in just a bit.”She insisted, keeping her volume up to be heard on both sides.

She heard Keith let out a low hum, clearly still concerned, but he respected her privacy regardless. Her shower ended up taking a lot longer than she had planned, as the strange loofah was extremely brittle and felt like it was ripping her skin open when she tried to use it to scrub off the vigu nectar. She swapped it out for one of the little wash clothes on the counter but it did take a little longer to get it all off.

When she poked her head out, the room was empty but Keith had left a change of clothes neatly folded on the table beside the room. She smiled and changed into them eagerly, appreciating the feel of the soft fabric against her skin. She took the time to pick up the ceremonial garbs she’d been wearing before, unsure if they were passed down or had been specifically made for her, and folded them into a very small stack that she left on the tank of the toilet. She could ask High Priestess Bulra what to do with them after she had taken a bit of time to unwind and rest up. She headed out to the front room, sitting on the edge of the cot and starting to apply the balm to the bites that she could reach.

She was just finishing up with the parts she could reach when Keith returned, with a t-shirt added to his outfit, carrying a small tray of piping hot food in one hand. “Think you can eat?” He asked as he walked into the room.

She smiled at him and nodded eagerly. “God, yes! Thank you,” She beamed, shifting to sit more at the edge of the bed. He pulled the small spare table over, set the tray on top of it for her, then carefully climbed back on the bed to sit right behind her. He took the jar from her wordlessly, opened it again, and pushed the back of her shirt up high enough that he could reach the bug bites there. “You’re a God-send, you know that?” She moaned out quietly at the feel of the cool cream being rubbed along her agitated skin.

He chuckled. “You sure about that? I’ve heard quite the opposite before,” He mused.

“Well, those people were idiots,” She grumbled, using the knife to cut into the hot loaf of some kind of bread. A dark red jam of some sort spilled out but she continued to cut a sliver off, scooped some of the jam up, speared a piece of bread and plopped it in her mouth. Despite clearly being bread and jam, it tasted more like pork chops and mashed potatoes. “What is this?” She asked curiously.

“No idea. I just went to the ground floor and told the staff that I needed a meal for the Goddess to regain her strength post-ceremony. They said this would be a high-protein meal that should get you back in tip-top shape before tomorrow morning,” He explained calmly.

She hummed and continued eating, too hungry to really be interested in conversation. It was funny, she realized, that she hadn’t thought twice about how good a plate of warm food sounded until it was right in front of her. Once he finished apply ointment to the remaining bug bites, Keith grabbed her hairbrush and started carefully working through the tangles in her hair. He even took the time to braid it for her as she finished licking the last remnants of jam from her fork. “Man, being the nature Paladin  _sucks_ ,” She huffed, turning around to throw her arms around him.

He laughed and took her up in his arms easily, setting her hairbrush aside and then carefully pulling them up towards the head of the bed. She stayed latched on to him, burrowing her face into the crook of his neck and enjoying his warmth. “If I had known what this ceremony entailed I would have said no for you. Those bites look pretty miserable,” He commented, one hand cupping and massaging the back of her neck.

“I still would have done it, though, for the sake of keeping the peace and buttering them all up. Being sacrificed to a bunch of mosquito-bee hybrids was a necessary sacrifice for the greater good of additional medical supplies. It’ll be good to be a little less reliant on the cryopods, after all. I mean, less time in there is more time liberating planets and kicking Galra butt,” She pointed out.

“Yeah, but it still bothers me that they didn’t go over everything with us before they took you away for the whole thing. They specifically said that you weren’t going to be in any danger,” He said.

She snickered a bit. “Getting swarmed by bugs isn’t being placed in danger. From what I understand – and, feel free to correct me, since you have more experience with this than I – getting swarmed by insects is supposedly a regular thing when you go out into the woods. I just got a really huge dose of it, but I guess it makes up for all the time I’ve spent indoors,” She said, shrugging a bit as she settled one hand against his chest and closed her eyes.

He chuckled a bit at her but didn’t prod further. There was a wind chime of some sort hanging in the window of the room, gently jostling and chiming with the breeze wafting in. As loathe as she was to admit it, there was something soothing about the natural air and the sound of the chime and the shared heat with Keith that kind of made the whole ordeal worth it. Nature was still over hyped, but she could see the simplistic pleasure to something like this.


	13. Privacy - NSFWish

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> NSFWish. The Castle Ship is a huge entity, impressive to those that they meet and even their opponents, to some extent. Sometimes, however, it feels like they’re living in an incredibly cramped apartment together

He had descended upon her while she was working in the hanger by herself. Hunk had headed off in need of a break to eat and check on something he was helping Coran with, said he’d be back in about two, maybe three hours. She had waved him off, sipping at a juice pouch while scribbling out some calculations on one of the holo-white boards they had. It had been about ten minutes after Hunk left that Keith arrived, leaning over her as she had reached to grab a slightly smaller stylus from across her work table. One of his hands was pressed on the table top itself, with the arm attached to it pressed along her hip, while the other hand was lightly stroking up along her arm, from wrist to shoulder and back again. She huffed out a small laugh and turned her head to face him better. “Hello, Keith,” She mused lightly.

“Hey,” He mumbled before tilting his head forward, pressing a small kiss to the exposed skin of her shoulder just beside the spaghetti strap of the tank top she was wearing.

“Did you need something?” She asked lightly, grabbing the stylus closer to the rest of the supplies she was using.

“You,” He mumbled back, kissing again before grazing his sharp teeth along the spot he’d just kissed. She shuddered and let out a low, soft moan in response. He smirked and did it again. “And it sounds like you might be cool with that.”

“Quite the assumption there, don’t you think?” She teased, quickly finishing up the equation she’d been working on before he’d come in and distracted her. He dipped his head to suckle a few small marks along her throat as she finished and saved the progress she’d made thus far.

“I’m just reading your body language,” He mumbled against her skin.

“Can you try asking like a good boy?” She asked, poking his nose with the stylus she’d been using.

He swatted it away playfully. “Don’t wanna. Just wanna get in close to you,” He answered bluntly.

“You’re such a needy boyfriend. It’s only been, what, five months since the last time we had sex?” She teased, turning her head to kiss him properly.

He kissed back, eager and wanting, and groaned when she pulled back, settling one hand on his jaw and pressing her thumb against his lips. He cracked his eyes and was pouting at her. “Yeah, I know. Sorry the Blade has been keeping me away for so long,” He mumbled.

“I think it’s more that Kolivan believes you work better when you’re sexually frustrated. Which is a completely outlandish sentiment, by the way. You get even more reckless than usual when you wanna get laid,” She pointed out with a small shrug.

“I think it’s more that Kolivan just doesn’t care that much. I’m a member of the Blade and that’s all I’m really good for; my personal business isn’t that big of a concern. I mean, their whole organization was founded on the principle of ‘Knowledge or death’; doesn’t exactly sound like a group completely invested in the longevity of their members, or how sexually satisfied they are, either,” He said back with a bland look.

“Honestly, you should just ditch the Blade and stay here. We could make much better use of you here on the Castle Ship, anyway,” She mused before turning to more fully face him. She slid both her hands up to cup his face and pull him for another kiss, nipping his lower lip playfully.

He huffed and parted his lips eagerly, letting her take charge and plunder his mouth, one hand staying pressed on the table while the other slid to grab at her ass, hoisting her upwards a bit. She wrapped one arm around his neck while she pressed the other on the table as well, using the leverage to help hoist herself up so she could hook her legs around his waist. “And what would you have me do here?” He asked when they pulled away, grinning a bit at her.

She smirked as she locked her ankles together behind his back and rolled her hips down against his, lightly twirling a lock of dark hair around her finger as he tilted his head back and let out a low open-mouthed moan. Sometimes he was just so easy to get all wiled up. “Well, Coran could always use help with maintaining the ship or operating systems during combat,” She mused, leaning forward a bit herself to pepper a few kisses along his jaw, following the bone to his ear. “Or I could just keep you tied up in my room, my own personal plaything.” She purred, nipping his earlobe and delighting in the shudder that coursed through him.

“Is that what you think would happen?” He breathed back, his hand on her ass helping to grind her down into him harder. “How do you know that I wouldn’t be unruly? How are you so sure that I’d be complacent and obedient?” He asked.

She smirked at him, leaning back to look at his face. “Oh, darling, you could be unruly if you wanted, but you know you’d give in. I already take good care of you, don’t I?” She goaded, one of her hands moving to glide down his front slowly. Her fingers hooked into the front of his jeans and gave a little tug. “After all, you like it when I take care of you, don’t you?”

He growled quietly at her words, bucking up against her and managing to get a sharp gasp from her. “I’d like it more if you’d start using your actions to speak for you,” He huffed out.

She smirked and gave his hair a sharp tug with the hand still tangled around his neck, pulling his head as far back as she could without actually hurting him, and latched on to his pulse point. She shifted a bit as sucked a dark hickey on his skin, moving so she was sitting on the table and pulled him along with her by one leg still curled around his hips, and let her other hand slide down to take a firm hold of him through his jeans. He bucked into her hand eagerly and she finally released his neck. She licked her lips in satisfaction at the dark mark almost glowing against his skin. “I haven’t done all that much to you, but you really do love it when I get rough with you, don’t you?” She asked.

He huffed and pressed forward for another open-mouthed kiss, but despite initiating it, he was clearly letting her take control still. She pressed her tongue in and moaned softly in encouragement for him to engage a bit more. She slackened her grip on his cock through his jeans a bit, instead starting to massage lightly to coax him into a harder state. When they pulled apart she gave his flushed cheeks each a quick peck.

“Now, how about we try this again, shall we? Can you ask me for what you want like a good boy?” She mused lightly, combing one hand through his hair while the other continued to palm him.

“I want you, please. I don’t care what you want to give me but I want you,” He whined out.

She grinned widely, opening her mouth to respond, when she heard a loud sharp gasp a few feet away. “Wow, you two are  _way_  kinkier than I thought!”

“Lance, what the  _Hell_?” She sputtered, shoving Keith back as far as she could as quickly as she could. The poor guy stumbled backwards but managed to catch himself before he could completely eat shit.

There was a look of pure murder on Keith’s face as he glared the other male down. “How long have you been standing there?” He snarled lowly.

Lance smirked a bit, shrugging and crossing his arms over his chest. “Oh, you know, long enough to hear you begging for Pidge to let you hit it like a dog in heat. She’s really got you wrapped around her little finger, doesn’t she?” He teased.

Pidge was blushing but, it wasn’t obvious if it was from embarrassment or anger. “What the Hell did you want?” She snapped at him, pushing up so she was no longer sitting on her workstation.

His sly grin turned over to her, eyes twinkling with mischief. “Hold on, first can we discuss what total freaks you two are? I mean, really? Here, at your workstation, where you repair our stuff and build new machines?”

“One time we had sex on this table while I was repairing your bayard,” Pidge said, tone flat. His eyes widened in horror but she made sure to keep her poker face in place. “It was right there, the whole time. I jerked him off and probably got some stuff on it while I was groping around for a tissue or hand cloth. Didn’t bother wiping it down since, you know, it’s partially white so I figured it wouldn’t be noticeable.”

Lance looked like he was going to be sick. “You two are  _filthy animals_! How  _dare_ you! Keep… Keep  _that_  stuff in your bedrooms and  _away_  from  _my bayard_!” He barked frantically, throwing his arms up and turning to storm out. Keith felt a small smirk worm on to his face. Impressed with his girlfriend’s bluff. “I’m telling Hunk what savages you are! Absolutely revolting!”

Pidge rolled her eyes and made a flapping hand motion while sticking her tongue out. He snickered a bit as well, deciding to let his frustration over being cock-blocked slide away at the way karma had gotten back at Lance.


	14. Daffodil

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Empty and cold, but she’d been anticipating that. She knew what to expect after all these years.”

Before she even opened her own eyes, she knew there was another set watching her. “I’m getting up, I’m getting up,” She grumbled while pushing herself upright, briefly glancing over at the other side of the bed. Empty and cold, but she’d been anticipating that. She knew what to expect after all these years. She turned around and smiled, sitting on the edge of the bed, and reaching down to stroke her daughter’s long honey colored locks. “Good morning, Aria. Feeling hungry?” She asked gently.

“Can we have pancakes?” The little girl asked curiously.

“I think I can do that. Are the boys up, too?” She asked while standing up. She stretched until her back popped, humming in contentment, then looked back down at her.

“Yeah. Newt’s messing with something on the kitchen table. Me and Kaden told him not to, cause you’d be mad, but he won’t listen,” She said, her tone a bit meeker. She was always uncomfortable with having to rat her brothers out for misbehaving.

She hummed again and walked over to the door, poking her head out and down the hallway. “ _Oliver Samuel Kogane_ , if a  _single one_  of my blueprints are even  _slightly_ moved from where I left them, you’re grounded until  _your own funeral service_!” She called out, using her patented Strict Mom voice. The sound of frantic rustling and a sharp bark of laughter caused her to smirk.

“Aria, you’re such a  _tattle-tail_!”

“Good job getting Mom, Ari!”

Pidge took her daughter’s hand and gave it a gentle squeeze of reassurance as they headed to the kitchen together. Kaden stood in the doorway with his arms crossed over his chest and an amused smirk on his lips as he watched his younger brother frantically try to return everything to its proper place. The nine year old looked so much like his father in that moment it almost made her do a double take. “We told you Mom would be mad if you messed with her stuff,” He practically sang at his sibling.

“It’s not  _my_  fault I’m curious! It’s in my  _inherited nature_!” He protested back without looking away from the task before him.

“Regardless of your nature,” Pidge mused as she walked in, ruffling her oldest child’s hair affectionately as she swept past, “you need to respect other people’s things.”

Newt huffed and looked over at her, flopping against the kitchen table dramatically. “But it’s all  _super cool_! Your specs for these new fighter pilot engines look  _super_ streamlined!” The five year old argued back.

Kaden perked up and walked a little closer to the table, head tilted and arms slowly unfolding. “You’re designing new engines for the fighter pilot ships?” He quizzed. Despite tending to take more after Keith than she, Kaden was still very smart and had an interest in certain technologies. He swore up and down that some day he’d be a great pilot just like his father.

“I’m trying to figure something out. The current models are a little slower and the engines tend to break down more often than they reasonably should. Just more proof of why the Garrison were idiots for not commissioning the job from me and Hunk sooner,” She laughed as she rummaged through the pantry. She pulled out a box of pancake mix – grateful that they still had some – as well as the loaf of bread. She then turned back to the children. “If you can get the table cleared off while I start on the cooking, I’ll tell you some more about it.”

Indigo and caramel eyes widened in delight before the two eagerly got to work. “Make sure to keep all the companion blueprints together with their same project specs!” Newt said eagerly.

“Do I look like an  _animal_  to you?” Kaden quipped back flatly.

Pidge snickered before looking down at Ari, tugging at her pant leg. “Can I help you make the pancakes?” She asked gently.

“Of course, sweetie,” She hummed, swiping a chair from the kitchen table and dragging it over to the stove with her. She then plucked her daughter up and set her on the chair, giving her better access to the counters, while she fished the bacon, eggs and butter from the fridge. While they worked on the food, Kaden used the step-stool she kept in the kitchen to get the plates, place mates and silverware. More times than not, the kids wanted to help with meals and clean-up, so the step-stool had been an investment that just seemed to make sense.

She let Ari crack the eggs and mix the ingredients for the pancakes with a whisk while she herself worked on the bacon. She didn’t like letting the kids make the bacon because the way it popped grease always startled them, though Kaden would never admit it. While she and Ari cooked, the boys were kind enough to also get out the maple syrup and prepare a glass of milk for each of them. Pancakes were easy to and quick to make, thankfully. Once the bacon and scrambled eggs were done, Kaden and Newt came to take the two platters to the table. She worked on showing Ari how to properly flip them, smiling proudly at how her daughter’s bright jade orbs lit up when she successfully flipped one by herself.

While they ate, they fell in to casual chatter. Pidge explained what she and Hunk had been figuring out about the new fighter ship engines, which had both boys squirming with excitement in their seats. Aria hadn’t inherited much of the family interest in technology or piloting or space travel, but she still listened respectfully and politely. “Are we going to take flowers to Daddy and Grandpa today?” She asked after the Garrison talk died down a bit.

Pidge blinked a bit in surprise, sipping her milk, before glancing over at the calendar she had posted in the kitchen. She tried to keep on posted in almost every room because she tended to lose track of time and it was a good way for her to keep track of important events. The date was in fact circled with a bright red marker, a small picture of a tombstone etched on it as well. “It’s already so late in the year, huh?” She mumbled to herself.

Newt snorted a bit and pinned his sister with a look. “How long have we been taking flowers now? Why wouldn’t we go again this year?” He quipped around a mouthful of bacon.

Aria flinched a bit at his words and turned her attention towards the tabletop. “Newt, be nice to your sister. She was just asking a simple question,” Pidge chided with a click of her tongue. It was her younger son’s turn to wilt a bit while Aria peeked at her mother through her bangs, seeming to relax at the small smile greeting her. “And yes, darling, we are gonna get some flowers to take to them. After breakfast, I’ll get together a picnic and we can all get dressed and hit the flower shop.”

“Do you know what kind of flowers we’re gonna get?” She asked excitedly.

“I was thinking I’d let you three pick the flowers this time. Does that sound like a plan?” She suggested, smiling at how all three of her kids perked up and nodded at the suggestion.

After they all finished eating, Pidge worked on cleaning up the breakfast dishes while the kids got ready. Kaden made sure that both Newt and Ari got ready first, helping them pick out clothes that matched, then got himself ready and scampered back to the kitchen. He pulled the step-stool over, grabbed a kitchen towel, and started drying the dishes as Pidge finished washing them. Despite only being nine years old, it was clear that he took his position as the oldest child very serious. He was always looking out for his younger siblings and doing whatever he could to help out around the house, which she certainly appreciated.

After the dishes were tended to, Pidge went back and got dressed herself, then returned and got the food prepared. Newt came to help her with the preparations for that while Kaden and Ari gathered the rest of the things they’d need for the picnic. The family worked together to get everything packed up in containers and placed inside the rolling ice chest they had. After making sure they had everything they needed, they piled into the car and headed out.

There was a small flower shop a few blocks from the cemetery that they stopped at; a small Mom-and-Pop place that she thought seemed nice. The whole interior of the store was heavy with the smell of damp manure, the flowers all placed out in the main area of the shop with a small counter off to the far wall. An older woman was settled behind the counter, preparing a vase of some kind. A younger girl approached them, bright salesperson smile already in place. “Hello! How are you all this morning?” She asked.

“Good,” Pidge said, trailing off as Newt yanked his hand from hers and tore off down one of the rows of flowers.

“I got him, Mom,” Kaden said before charging after his younger brother with a sharp shout. Aria stayed pressed close to her, clutching her hand with one of her own.

“Energetic little guys, I see,” The employee said with a smile.

Pidge’s own smile was a bit tired as she nodded in response, taking a quick glance to check her name tag. It said Rachel with a little star at the end. A cute little touch, she thought. “Mostly just the one. He isn’t happy if he isn’t causing  _some_  kind of pandemonium,” She laughed lightly.

Rachel nodded before kneeling down to look at Aria, cocking her head a bit. “Your big brothers are really excited to be here, huh?” Her answer came in a meek nod, partially hidden by the head of a stuffed animal. The timidness of the little girl didn’t seem to dissuade her from trying to start a conversation, though. “I like your plush. Does it have a name?”

“His name is Muffin!” Aria said excitedly, immediately warming up. Muffin was her favorite and longest owned of her many plush toys. She held the fluffy green toy out a bit to give the employee a better look while Pidge tried to get a peek of either boys over the rows of planets after hearing a disgruntled shout come from Kaden. “He’s a dinosaur called a brontosaurus and his favorite foods are cookies and really big leaves!” The doll had been the very first thing ever purchased for her when Pidge found out she was expecting again.

She had called Keith while he was on his way home from a business trip and Kaden had let it sleep, his almost-three-year-old mind too excited to recall her telling him not to tell. Keith had stopped by a small toy store once he got back in town and gotten a dinosaur plush for each of the kids. Though the boys didn’t really play with theirs anymore, they both still had Crusher the red t-rex, who guarded Kaden’s desk, and Prickles the orange stegosaurus, who Newt still cuddled with at bed time.

“Well, it’s a pleasure to meet both of you! What can I help you with today?” She asked as she moved to stand upright again.

“We’re here to get flowers to take to Daddy and Grandpa! Mommy said that we can pick them out, too!” She beamed back, not seeming to notice how the worker’s smile faltered at her words. Kaden returned as she spoke, dragging his younger brother along by the hood of his jacket, the knees of his own jeans damp and wearing a thin coating of planting soil.

“Are you okay?” Pidge asked worriedly, kneeling down.

“Yeah, I caught myself before I fell too far into the soil pile. I need to wash my hands, though,” Kaden said, releasing Newt’s hood and showing his hands to her. They were covered in grime all the way up to his wrists.

“Now it’s gonna be on my hood,” Newt grumbled, crossing his arms as he pouted, as indignant as any six year old had ever been.

“Good,” The older hissed back.

“Newt, you act up one more time and you’re gonna be grounded from the television and the computer for a week. You shouldn’t be running around in here; the floors are wet and your brother could have gotten really hurt if he’d fallen into a table or the floor,” Pidge warned with a small scowl. She watched her younger son tense before sagging a bit and letting his arms unfold, nodding quietly as he stepped a bit closer to her. She then looked up at Rachel. “You wouldn’t happen to have a bathroom or sink he could wash up in, would you?” She asked with a nervous laugh.

“Of course, follow me,” She said, indicating with her head. They followed her to the counter and found a sink positioned at the other end. There was even a small step stool resting under it to help Kaden reach up. While he washed his hands, Rachel briefly disappeared to the back and returned with a small rag, letting Pidge use it to scrub as much of the soil off as she could. “So I take it you’re just looking for two tradition bouquets today? We have several preset themes that would work well for you situation.” She suggested.

“Actually, we just need one bouquet,” She said as she stood upright and offered her the towel back. Rachel set it along the back of the sink, resting against the two knobs. “And I promised I’d let the kids pick the flowers themselves. As long as the colors of types they pick are good matches, that is.”

“Ah, must be a family plot,” Rachel mumbled the first part to herself thoughtfully before nodding. She smiled gently down at the three children watching her curiously. “Let’s make a lovely bouquet for them. Now, what would be best, would be to select the centerpiece flower and then we can go through a few options of what look best with it,” Rachel suggested as she started to lead them back towards the selections. Aria kept pace with her eagerly, looking completely awed by the various colorful options all around them, while Kaden and Newt stayed closer to Pidge. “Were there any particular colors you did or didn’t want to include?” She asked, turning the question more to Pidge than the children.

“Well, I was going to say I want to avoid flowers with darker colors, but it seems like most of your selection is on the brighter side already, so take that as you will,” She laughed lightly.

Newt wandered over to a small pot with a pink flower in it, sniffed, then made a face. “Bleh. Not that one,” He grumbled, shaking his head and sticking out his tongue.

Rachel giggled lightly at his reaction before perking up at Aria peering at a large yellow flower in specific. “Do you like that one?” She asked.

Ari nodded slowly before looking up at her. “What’s this one called?”

“It’s called a daffodil. Daffodils are representative of new beginnings and many people believe them to be a perfect representation of spring itself,” She explained gently.

“Flowers can have meanings?” Newt asked, curiosity piqued at the idea. He headed over and looked at the flower as well, tilting his head this way and that, before giving it a small sniff. His nose scrunched a little but he didn’t seem to mind the scent too much.

“Why, yes! Some people can have whole conversations just using the language of flowers in a bouquet to articulate it!” Rachel beamed.

Kaden walked over and looked over the daffodil as well, giving it a small whiff and smiling a bit. “I like this one, too. Mom?” He turned to look at her curiously.

She nodded and watched her kids follow the young employee around the store, listening intently as she picked out other flowers to pair off with the daffodils and explained the meaning of those as well. While she put the bouquet together at the counter, the older woman motioned the kids over and taught them how to make flower crowns and necklaces with some extra little flowers she had. They were daisies, from what Pidge recognized from when she’d gone selecting flowers for she and Keith’s wedding, which surprised her since she hadn’t been particularly invested in the flowers and that had been over ten years ago. “Mommy, can we get some more daisies? I wanna make flower crowns for Daddy and Grandpa and you, too,” She said happily, carefully readjusting the little tiara on her head.

Unable to deny those pleading eyes, she shelled out the money and then loaded them all back in the car for the short drive to the cemetery.

She was grateful that the anniversary had fallen on a Sunday this year, as there was minimal traffic on the road but also very few people at the cemetery in general. She’d always thought that Sunday’s would be a more popular day for visiting graves and setting funeral plans but figured it made sense that it was more about when the families could all get together as a group to grieve together. She pulled the ice chest up the hill to the large oak at the top, where the headstone rested, while Newt carried the bouquet and Kaden carried the little picnic basket with the blanket and utensils they’d need, the two boys lightly bickering with each other and pushing Pidge to wonder just how much it would be to buy a plot for herself. Aria charged ahead of them, her two remaining flower crowns held carefully in her hands, Muffin tucked under her arm so that his head could still poke out a good ways. She hadn’t wanted to ruin the flower crown she had made for him, after all.

“Daddy!” She cried excitedly, darting forward and skidding to a stop just as the tall figure turned to face her. She held the crowns up for inspection. “Daddy, lookie! The nice lady at the flower shop taught us how to make flower crowns! I made one for you and Grandpa!”

“These are beautiful, Ari,” Keith said, kneeling down to gently embrace her, “thank you.” He tipped his head down so she could place it on, chuckling when he saw the plush toy also wearing a floral accessory, then watched as she darted over to the headstone a few feet away to place the other.

“Only a stupid idiot would use Horace over Gertrude. I mean, Gertrude’s got higher speed and high stamina, so it’s harder for your opponent to catch you if you play her right,” Kaden commented flatly as they started to come up over the top of the hill.

Newt snorted. “Horace is a  _tank_! You can hit him but he’s just going to keep coming at you!”

“You mean  _trying_  to come at you; he’s as slow as a beached whale dragging itself in the sand,”

“ _Your face_  is a beached whale!”

“How dare you,” Pidge grumbled as she approached Keith, choosing to step around the boys looking ready to launch themselves at each other. He stood back up and gave her a quick peck to her forehead, hoping that would placate her. “You better be planning to be on dish duty for the next couple days, because those two have been at it since they woke up this morning.”

“They’re just very passionate kids. They come from a family of very passionate people,” He said with a small chuckle.

“Oh, is  _that_  what we’re calling it now?” She asked with another huff, though her lips had turned up in a small smile.

He nodded a bit before looking over at the two of them. “What are you two arguing about over there?” He asked calmly.

They both looked up at him before Newt pointed accusingly at Kaden. “He’s trying to claim that Gertrude is the best character in Destruction Dome! But clearly that position belongs to Horace!”

Keith tapped his chin in thought for a moment, humming gently then nodded. “Well, the good news is that you’re both wrong. Hiroshima is the best character in the game,” He said with a small shrug, grinning at the protesting cries he received at the statement.

Pidge smiled as she watched them. When they first returned to Earth, she noticed that Keith would disappear from dawn until dusk. The first two years he refused to explain, but then he finally admitted it was the anniversary of his father’s death. He would come up to sit and talk with the headstone, finding it to be some kind of comforting. She wasn’t sure how true that was, given how he’d be in a sullen mood for the two or three days following his trips. After she was made aware, she started coming to join him around lunch time and the tradition simply stuck, even after they started having kids. It seemed like having someone else there – someone that he could share stories about his dad with that could talk back – had helped to alleviate some of the gloom that came home with him.

She watched Keith set the bouquet while the kids placed the blanket down, his smile soft and happy despite the circumstances, and felt her heart warm a bit, glad to know that their family was a comfort to him.


	15. Aliens

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Implications of torture! After getting booted from a summer camp, Katie has to tag around with her dad at the Garrison base. Things get slightly more interesting, however, when she starts following around a different Garrison employee. Sample of an upcoming multi-chapter story.

She watched everything around her with a sharp eye and keen interest.

Bringing your child into work wasn’t something that a lot of Garrison officers typically did – mostly because they weren’t supposed to – but this was a special case. “You see,” Her dad explained to his superior officer with a small, almost-nervous chuckle, “my wife is away visiting family. Her father is terribly ill and, well, we decided it would be better for Katie to stay here. It would be too hard for my dear Colleen to help her mother, whom is also terribly frail, take care of her father as well as keep a seven year old entertained. And it’ll only be for seven, eight weeks, at most!”

Commander Sampson eyed her wearily as her father spoke, still seeming unsure, before turning his attention back to her dad. “Are you sure that she will behave herself, Samuel?” He asked calmly.

“Oh, absolutely! I’ll keep her stuck to my hip like glue!” He promised, smiling wide and reassuringly at the other.

“Will your son also be following you along?”

“Oh, no, Matthew is away at a science summer camp until late August. Colleen should be home by then,” He said. Katie had originally gone to a science summer camp, too, but been kicked out after she stuffed another kid’s bunk with honey to play a real-life game of Ants-in-the-Pants. She was accused of being too rowdy and mean-spirited; she argued that she was standing up for herself against one of the kids bullying her, since none of the camp counselors had tried to help her at all. Samuel had stood beside his daughter, saying something about “bad press” and “negligence lawsuits”, which successfully got both Katie and the other child booted from the program.

Which had left her preening in delight. She may have gone down, but at least she took that jerk down with her.

With a slow exhale through his nose, Commander Sampson turned to Samuel again. “I’ll allow it, but make sure you keep her close at hand. The Garrison is not a daycare; it’s a military organization that trains space explorers,” He said strictly, sizing Katie up one last time, before heading back off to resume his duties.

“Thank you, Sir!” Samuel called after him before beaming down at her. He reached down and ruffled her hair before taking her hand. “Well, looks like you’re going to be getting the grand tour of the Garrison a few years early! You excited?”

“Yeah! Can I sit in for your lectures?” She asked eagerly.

He chuckled and gently steered her towards his office. “Absolutely! But do make sure to behave and stay quiet; can’t have you giving my students all the answers, now, can we?” He chuckled as they headed in. He gathered up his laptop, folders and a few other things before handing her the little messenger bag with some of her things in it. Once she had properly settled the strap on her shoulder, he took her hand and they headed along the halls towards the lecture halls.

And for the first two times she watched his lecture, she’d been enthralled. The third time, however, her interest started to wane. She tried her best to stay quiet – really, she did – but she was bored with this and flopped about in her father’s office chair. Sometimes, when he asked a question and there was a long pause between volunteers to answer, she’d let out a long, pitiful sigh. The students found this hilarious each time she did it, but she could tell her dad was reaching the ends of his patience by the time the lecture was over. “Katie, darling, you promised to behave,” He said, keeping his tone gentle as he knelt down and spun the chair around so she was facing him again.

“But I’m  _bored_!” She whined loudly, feeling no need to tone it back now that there were so few students left in the room. The last couple chuckled a bit at her but she ignored them. She flipped around so that she was sitting in his chair upside down. “I like your lecture, but why can’t you do a different one for the next class?”

“That’s not how a teaching plan works, Katie,” He said patiently. He reached down, picked her up, and set her back down in the chair so she was seated properly. “I have to make sure all my students in all my classes are on the same page so they can work together or seek me out if they need additional help with something.”

“Showing the future head of our department a thing or two, Samuel?” A warm voice teased from the large doors leading into the classroom.

Sam chuckled and glanced over. “Hello, Hannah. And I’m just trying to convince my daughter, Katie, to behave despite being bored with my lecture for the day,” He explained, motioning the woman over. Katie thought she looked kind of familiar; an adult she’d probably seen at one of those boring work events her dad had to attend a lot. “Katie, this is Hannah Curtis. She’s one of the head researches in life on other planets.”

Katie perked up at that, eyes getting bright at that. “You mean you get to study aliens?” She asked.

Hannah giggled politely as she walked down one of the aisles to the table. “Well, so far we haven’t found any in the way you’re thinking; mostly just alien plant life. But it’s still pretty interesting stuff,” She said happily. She then turned her attention back to Sam. “I was wondering if you had a spare tablet charger. I’m working on a new project with a lot of complicated data and, well, I’ve never been good about remembering where I keep those chargers.”

Samuel chuckled and nodded, opening a drawer of his desk and rummaging through. “I swear, between you and the Douglas’, I’m gonna run out of spare charging cables,” He teased lightly, pulling out a small, bound black cable and offering it to her. “What projects are you working on right now, anyway? I heard they’d transferred you off of the Callisto research study to put you in charge of another program, but didn’t hear any specifics being mentioned.”

Hannah chuckled a bit as she fiddled with the cord. “Oh, just your run-of-the-mill research on a foreign organism located a few miles off. They think it has something to do with that meteor shower a few weeks back but I’m still not sure. You know, Samuel,” She said, her gaze shifting to Katie as she spoke before snapping back up at him, “I could take Katie with me back to my lab, if you’d like. I have some samples and tests to run that I could use a little bit of help with. She could take notes for me and maybe even get to see some of the results up close and personal.” She offered, fiddling with the cable in her hands.

Katie gasped and sat upright immediately, clutching at the arm of the chair and looking at Sam with large, pleading eyes. “Can I, Dad? Pretty, pretty please?”

He looked down at her and scowled. “Katie, darling, I told Commander Sampson that you would stay with me,” He said.

“Aw, Sam,” Hannah laughed lightly, “I’ll deal with Derek. I’m sure he won’t mind so long as she isn’t wandering the halls aimless and alone.”

He still seemed a bit unsure, turning his attention back to Katie. He reached down and gently pushed her unruly copper-tinted bangs from her face. “Do you promise to behave yourself for Hannah? Meaning you’ll mind your manners and do as your told and not act out?” He asked.

“I promise I will if you let me go with her!” She insisted, sticking her lower lip out just enough to make it quiver.

He chuckled and ruffled her hair affectionately. “Okay, you can cut it back on the theatrics. Just make sure you keep your promise to listen, because if you don’t, Hannah will bring you back to me in a heartbeat, understand?”

She beamed up and held her arms up, embracing him tightly once he leaned close enough to be reached. “I will! Thank you so much, Daddy!” She slipped out of the chair and took the hand Hannah offered to her, staring up at her excitedly. “Will I really get to look at samples if I behave?”

“Of course! Oh, and I’ll bring her back for lunch, too. I figure, depending on how interesting she finds everything, I could keep her with me after that, too, if it’s okay,” Hannah suggested.

“Let’s just see how she does between now and lunch,” Samuel said, picking her bag up off the floor and gently draping it over her shoulder, “and determine where to go from there, okay?”

“Thank you, Daddy! I’ll see you later!” She called as she walked along with the older woman, waving back at him as they headed out. She looked up at Hannah curiously as they stepped out into the hallway, weaving between the throngs of students darting here and there before the bell could chime again. “Have you ever seen a real alien before? Because my Dad says that aliens are real but that we just haven’t gotten enough proof yet.”

Hannah giggled a bit. “What if I told you that I have a real life alien in my lab, right now?” She asked, leaning down a bit and lower her voice to avoid being overheard.

“Really?” Katie nearly shrieked, eyes shining with excitement.

Hannah gently pressed a finger to her lips but giggled despite herself. “Settle down, dear. We can’t have the whole place finding out about it,” She said gently. Katie gasped quietly and clapped a hand against her mouth, nodding in understanding. “But yes, we did. It’s a small thing and we still don’t know a lot about it, but we’re doing the best we can to learn more about it and why it came to Earth.” She explained before fishing a key card from her jacket pocket and sliding it through the elevator. She let Katie enter first, then stepped in herself.

The ride in the elevator was mostly quiet, with only Katie’s excited humming to fill the void. When the doors opened, they were in a lower floor area that was filled with transparent cells with cots and toilets but nothing else. It reminded her of a scene she’d seen in a movie she and Matt had watched one night when their sitter fell asleep on the couch while their parents were out. The rooms had transparent, glass doors with multiple little holes in them for oxygen and, if she were to guess, communication. There were tons of other Garrison scientists running about, but they had swapped out their Garrison golds and olives for traditional scientist white coats. Hannah approached an area with desks to their left, already starting to shrug off her blazer. Katie followed after her, unsure of what else to do. “Let me just slip into my proper coat and I’ll take you to see it, okay, Katie?” Hannah said politely.

“Dr. Fritz,  _there_  you are! We’ve been looking  _all over_ -!” Another scientist, a younger looking fellow with hair that looked like it had just been rubbed against a balloon and wild green eyes darted over, a tablet clutched tightly in his grasp. He cut off, however, when he saw Katie and let out a terrified squawk. “ _Dr. Fritz_!” He voice grew high and cracked with anxiety.

“Oh, settle down, Andy! This is Katie, Commander Holt’s daughter. I’m sure you remember her from the company picnic a few weeks ago, right?” Hannah said with a small wave, finally shrugging her blazer off completely and moving to grab the white coat tossed over the back of the chair. Katie waved politely at Andy before her attention shifted to a picture of Callisto on Dr. Fritz’ desk. She seemed to notice, by how she plucked it up and offered it to her. “Here, if you’d like a better look. Pretty neat, huh, Katie?” She giggled.

“Doctor Fritz, this is  _highly problematic_! We can’t have a  _child_  wandering around here with  _that thing_  in here! What if word got out? If Commander Wickler found out what we were doing-!” He yelped again when Hannah grabbed him by the lapels of his coat and pulled him closer.

“Commander Wickler  _won’t_  find out  _anything_  if you keep your mouth  _shut_  and let me do my  _damn job_. I know what I’m doing, unlike the rest of you,” She said, keeping her voice quiet to avoid attracting Katie’s attention. She then shoved him back and glared at him. “Now, Andy, why don’t you go make sure our guest is awake and ready for visitors? I promised Katie that she could see it for herself.” She said evenly, turning her attention and a bright smile back to the young girl beside her.

Andy still looked uncomfortable but nodded. “Of course, Dr. Fritz,” He said quietly, rapping his fingers along the tablet as he headed off.

“So you’re a doctor? Do you specialize in aliens?” Katie asked, offering the picture back to Hannah.

She smiled and nodded, calmly placing the picture back on her desk. “Indeed I am. Well, the degree technically says I’m a doctor of Biology, but I’ve always been more interested in the anatomy of foreign entities. This is the first time it’s been something more than a plant or a root. This one… This one could yield some real information about what space is like,” She said, her voice becoming awestruck the longer she spoke.

Katie smiled wider herself. She hoped that someday she could be as passionate as Hannah was about her work.

Hannah seemed to snap free of her moment and led Katie along. “Now, I want you to stay close to me. It can get a little aggressive if you get too close to the glass of its cell,” She explained as they walked. Most of the units were empty but the farthest one back was where Hannah finally stopped. “It usually tends to duck under the cot and stay in the corner, but if you look you should be able to see it’s eyes.” She advised, pointing at the area in question.

Katie looked down to see two narrowed, glowing gold eyes watching her from beneath the mattress of the small bed. She gasped and immediately scrambled down, sitting cross-legged and leaning a bit closer to the plate-glass of the cell. Hannah stepped back a bit further as she observed Katie’s behavior, going until she was nearly pressed against the glass of the empty cell across from the one the subject was being held in. “Hello,” She said with a soft gasp.

The eyes widened a bit before she could see the silhouette of whatever it was moving. She heard Hannah mumble something under her breath but she couldn’t make out exactly what she said. The figure shifted out, crawling out while staying low to the ground, and she blinked in surprise at the alien staring back at her. It’s eyes were a bright gold with slim pupils, but the eyes were set in a humanoid face of pale purple skin. There was also a mop of inky hair with two cat-like ears sticking out, the ears covered in a purple fur that match his skin. The ears also had two little tufts at the tip, the fur there a slightly darker purple than the rest. It was wearing Earth attire, which she found a little strange,  and the bright red shirt paired with tan khakis seemed like an odd fit. She also noticed a long, fluffy purple tail curling behind it and a strange collar of some sort around it’s neck.

She shifted a bit closer herself, starting to reach out to touch the glass, when Andy darted back over and gasped. “It came out!” He sputtered in alarm.

Immediately, the alien hissed violently, revealing long and sharp looking fangs, before scampering back under the bed. Hannah growled and whipped her head around to glare at him. “You  _simple-minded idiot_!” She hissed, walking over to him.

Katie watched them for a moment then scooted a bit closer, leaning up a little so that she could speak near one of the vents. “Hello, my name is Katie,” She called lightly.

Hannah paused in her berating of Andy and watched, shifting her attention from Katie to the alien inside the cell whom had perked back up a little bit from the other speaking to him.

“I take it you haven’t spent a lot of time on Earth, but it’s good that you at least got some clothes. Hopefully it not too bad, since I’m not sure how comfy it is with your tail and all. I mean, unless a hole was cut in the back so that your tail could come out easier? I can’t really tell, since you seem to like hiding under the bed,” She said.

The alien shifted inside the cell, moving to lay down on its belly. It was the most at east that it had been since they’d found it half-dead on the side of the road nearly three weeks back.

“So, like, I take it your type of alien are kinda like cats? My Aunt Lucy has a cat that runs under the couch or the bed whenever visitors come over. She says that he’s a scaredy cat, but I think it’s just more that he doesn’t like Matt cause he pets him weird,” She said, tapping her feet together as she spoke. She leaned back a bit on her hands, getting more comfortable. “Matt’s my big brother. He’s okay when he isn’t being a total jerk. Sometimes he calls me Pidge, cause he says I’m small like a pigeon, and I hate it.” She continued to prattle on for as long as she was allowed, promising that she’d draw a picture of the new puppy they’d just gotten for him to see while she was eating her lunch.

Hannah dropped her back of with her Dad after about two hours, promising to come get her again a little later.

———————————————————

“Dr. Fritz, I don’t understand why you brought that little girl in here. She could tell Commander Holt about the alien and blow the whistle on our research studies!” Andy squeaked out anxiously, clutching the tablet so tightly that it looked like the screen might crack. He was standing beside her desk as she turned her tablet back on, humming quietly as it loaded. He glanced down at the tablet in his hands, at the near-empty document regarding the alien they’d found. He didn’t have much to say about it other than it’s appearance and the accelerated rate at which it’s injuries had healed.

“Andy, we have a lovely little opportunity placed before us,” She said evenly, plucking out the stylus and beginning to write down some information. Added to her own list of information – which also included the alien’s hostile and volatile temperament, as well as its apparent lack of Earth knowledge or speaking capabilities – she added a few notes to her file.

“What do you mean?” He asked, trying to peer over her shoulder at what she’d written. Instead, she turned her chair around with a quick snap and pointed her stylus at him, less than an inch from touching his nose. He took a step back and gulped.

“How about instead of  _questioning_  me,” She mused, her tone sugary sweet and fatal, “you  _follow_  my orders to assure the integrity of our research? Katie Holt can be an interesting little pawn that can help us figure out where this thing came from. That kind of information could be invaluable to the Garrison.” She glared before tilting back in her seat, adjusting to reread the report she had drafted up about her research for the day.

**Subject is a potential juvenile specimen of species; more data needed to confirm. Subject seems to have a higher tolerance for pain than humans; electrocution caused clear pain, but had a higher tolerance than human before pain reached excessive levels. Heightened healing element continues to be prominent factor; wounds caused by electrocution assessment seemed to heal more effectively than would heal for a human specimen once current was shut down. Healing element only seems to take effect once injury has ceased but will need to conduct further research to confirm. New assessments are being completed to determine the intelligence and amount of knowledge the subject has about Earth culture and habits. As of now, seems to recognize inflection and volume as indicators of intent of words; ability to understand the language has yet to be determined. Assessment schedule shall be properly scheduled and finalized to determine.**

She smirked and picked her tablet back up. “Andy, go get a testing room and tranquilizer gun ready, would you? I want to run a few more tests on the subject’s limitations in regards to pain tolerance and the healing aspect of it before I start figuring out a proper schedule for the rest of the tests,” She said while standing up.

The other nodded and headed off, glancing back over his shoulder as she headed down along the aisle to the cell it was resting inside. Shortly after Katie had left, it seemed to go back on the defensive, its anxiety hyped up. “You must be so lonely, aren’t you?” Hannah giggled, lightly wrapping her knuckles against the glass.

A hiss that was most likely meant to sound threatening was her answer.

“Don’t worry now, little one. I think I can schedule regular play dates for you and Katie. Would you like that? Having a little friend to talk to?” She mused, pushing away from the glass to close the tablet and tuck it into one of the large inner pockets of the coat. “So long as we keep things under wraps, Katie will continue playing into our hands quite nicely. We can assess of how much use you’ll be to use. And who knows! Perhaps we’ll even be able to locate whatever kind of ship you came here on! That would certainly be a discovery worth something to Commander Wickler, maybe even keep us from getting read the riot act for keeping you under wraps!” She said with a happy sigh, pressing one hand to her chest.

If she could just make that reality, everything she’d been through would be worth it.

Andy reappeared a moment later with the gun she’d asked for, passing it over uneasily. “Dr. Fritz, I wasn’t sure what you wanted to check so I just set out a whole bunch of different options. I hope that’s acceptable,” He stammered out uneasily.

Dr. Fritz turned and smiled, a cruel little thing, and gave his cheek a little pat. “Thank you, Andy. I’ll meet you in there in a moment,” She said before pulling a small key card from her pocket. This one was different from the one she used for the elevator, a bit smaller and was a pale blue hue, so that she distinguish them and avoid getting asked questions about the smaller one. She slid it through the card reader beside the cell and beamed as the door slowly slid up.

The subject, as she had learned once before, was surprisingly quick, but luckily she was a faster shot.

———————————————-

Katie had been thrilled to bits when Hannah offered to take her for half the day to make things easier on Samuel. “I can see why you wanted to bring her with you, Sam,” Hannah had said with a bright smile. She reached down and gently gave Katie’s shoulder a squeeze. “She’s such a good little helper!”

Sam stared at her surprise, blinked, then chuckled a bit. “My, you must have really been able to keep her interest then! If she doesn’t enjoy something, she tends to become a bit unruly!” He said.

“Alien plants can be rather interesting, I’ll have you know,” She teased lightly. “If it’s okay, I’d like to take her on for as long as she’s here as my helper. I could take here around the same time every day, bring her back up for lunch, take her back to my lab afterwards, and then bring her back in time for your last lecture of the day. Would that be okay?”

“So long as she wants to go and you don’t mind having her, I suppose there isn’t a problem with it,” He said, smiling at his daughter. There was comfort in knowing that she was gaining more knowledge despite not being in the camp still. At least this way he didn’t have to worry about her getting bullied by a bunch of immature little ingrates. He smiled and waved as the two of them headed back out of the lecture hall.

“Can I ask a question, Dr. Fritz?” Katie asked curiously as they walked along.

“Katie, you can call me Hannah. We’re friends, after all,” She said, her smile and voice warm to the younger beside her.

The younger beamed up at her. “Okay, Hannah. I wanted to ask about… Um… The alien,” She said, lowering her voice and mouthing out the last bit. Hannah hummed and nodded as they got into the elevator. “Well, where did you find him? Was he out attacking people? Or was he, like, eating power lines or something?” She asked curiously.

“Oh, I found it while doing some additional work. See, I had driven to a separate Garrison base to assist another researcher with examining some samples they acquired from a meteor,” She explained as she slid the card key through and began the descent. “I was driving home to my hotel late one night, and it ran out into the road from the treeline nearby. At first, I thought I had just hit a large dog or something, but when I stopped, I found that I had actually hit it. I figured this would be a wonderful chance to learn a bit more about the life forms we share the universe with.”

Katie’s brow knitted a bit at her words. “Do you think… Do you think it was lost? And that was why it ran out into the road?” She asked worriedly.

“Katie, darling, it is much better that it be here. After all, it clearly knows next to nothing about human culture or life on Earth. And the poor thing was terribly injured from being hit! If not for me bringing it here, it probably would have died. I, in a way, have saved its life,” She said calmly as they reached their floor. The doors slid open and she gently ushered Katie out and into the front room. “It’s a win-win situation for us all, really. It stays alive and well-fed; we gain more knowledge about what aliens in our universe are capable of.”

Katie nodded mutely but said nothing. Taking her silence as anticipation, Hannah hurried her along to the cell.

Andy was there, carefully shoving a tray of food into the cell through a slim slot on the floor. He looked over and plastered on a nervous smile. “A-Ah, Katie Holt! Welcome back to our neck of the woods!” He said, glancing from her to Dr. Fritz uneasily.

His response from his boss was a curt nod. “We’ll have to see if he’ll come out to eat. He hasn’t seemed too keen on having guests to talk with him while he eats,” Hannah advised Katie as she settled on the floor in front of the cell, much like she had the day before.

“Maybe none of the things you’ve wanted to talk to him before are things he wants to talk about,” Katie said as she opened her little bag and fished out her drawing pad and crayons. She flipped to a new page, opened her box, and pulled out the brown crayon first. “I mean, I know I’d be less likely to want to eat without someone to have a fun conversation with.”

A quick glance over the top of her page revealed two gleaming yellow eyes keyed in on her. Good, she had its attention. That was a start.

She turned her attention back towards her drawing as she started to drag the crayon along the pages. “So, it’s clear you aren’t from Earth. So you must be from some place really far away and really cool, huh? But I guess Earth is kinda cool to you, huh? Since you’ve never been here before?” She said. After a small pause, she switched the brown crayon for the gray one instead. “That’s one of the things me and Matt like about when we do big family trips, anyway. Getting to see all the different places we’ve never been before, I mean,” She said before lifting her head again.

The alien had crept out a bit further and settled to imitate her posture, sitting on the other side of the glass to watch her in exchange.

She smiled and giggled. “So, my name’s Katie. What’s yours?”

Silence for a beat, before the alien cocked it’s head, mouthing out its response of, “Keith.”


	16. Brainwash

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Blood warning! Knowledge or death isn’t just the Blade mantra because it sounds cool. There’s a bit of reason behind it.

He had no idea what to expect when he saw medics running down the hallway from his room. He knit his brow as they started to turn away from the doorway, his blood freezing his veins when he saw blood covering their gloved hands. It wasn’t Galran blood, either, which he learned was a lighter shade of red that bordered on orange. No, the blood was the distinct red that he recognized from his battles of youth and injuries during his time as an intergalactic soldier of justice and truth. “No,” He mumbled shakily, freezing for a moment before he charged forward, starting the two medics.

He was the only part-human member of the Blade.

He was one of the only Earthlings in space.

There were only seven other Earthlings that the blood could have come from.

Only one of them would have had reason to be here.

But she shouldn’t be here.

They hadn’t made plans because he’d just barely returned from a mission.

He darted over, only to be caught by the arm by Kolivan. “Do not enter the room. We need to finish documenting the scene before we move the body,” He said evenly.

His heart catapulted into his throat.  _Body? Move the body?_  “What… What happened?” He wheezed out, trying to peer around him. He didn’t see much, but he saw one extended arm from around the corner of his bed, covered in blood from the elbow back down to where it disappeared. There was more blood speckled along her arm going up towards her hand, fingers loosely clutching what looked like the little crystal paper weight she’d gotten for him from a mining planet Team Voltron had visited. The small silver band on her ring finger was the only confirmation that he needed.

There was no question that it was Pidge.

“It was Rilumer,” Kolivan said calmly, stepping aside so that the medics could go back in. This time, they had a stretcher with them. “Apparently they used him to call her here with the communicator the two of you use to communicate. He sent a message pretending to be you to lure her here.”

The medics lowered the stretcher and hope fluttered at the sharp, shuttering intake of breath he heard Pidge release at being moved. She wasn’t dead! She could still be okay! “It would seem that one of Zarkon’s scientists was able to get a chip placed on him on your previous mission together. The chip allowed them to take control of him whenever they so chose. Zarkon and his must have seen their chance when you went against order to retrieve Rilumer on that mission,” Kolivan’s words snapped Keith’s attention back to him. The older male regarded him coolly, only a small ember of rage crackling in his eyes. “There is a reason we insist that the mission objective be more important. Situations like this occur because of young kit-brained fools like you thinking you know better. Hopefully this will serve as a lesson to you that our ways have their reasoning.”

“Sir, she is still alive,” One of the medics said as they started to wheel Pidge out. It was clear she hadn’t expected anything, given the casual sweater and jeans she was wearing, but also that she had fought with everything she had in her by all the gory defensive wounds littering her arms and legs.

“Get her to the medical bay immediately. I will send word to Team Voltron to see if they can get here with their healing pods. For now, do what you can to stabilize her; we cannot let Zarkon succeed in killing a Paladin of Voltron,” Kolivan said strictly.

“She’s going to need blood,” The medic said worriedly.

“I can give her some of mine!” Keith insisted, causing them all to look at him. He pressed one hand to his chest. “Pidge and I… We’re both blood type A. If blood types don’t match for humans, the blood can have an adverse reaction and make the receiver really sick. Please, I’ll go with you and you can give her mine. If it’ll save her life, take as much as you need, as much as you want!” He insisted.

After a moment of staring, Kolivan nodded. “Hurry along before she is past the point of saving,” He said calmly. The medics nodded and hurried along, Keith hot on their tails. He glanced back briefly, watching as Kolivan pulled his luxite blade from its holder and strided into the room. Most likely to deal with the brainwashed Rilumer. He shuddered briefly and turned his attention back to Pidge, taking her hand and giving a small squeeze to try and alert her that he was there.

He needed her to be safe right now. He could deal with all the guilt once she was well again.


	17. Shamrock

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pidge isn’t always the best at verbal expressions of her feelings. Luckily enough, she’s with a partner who can understand the deeper meanings of her gestures.

When the Paladins returned to Earth once the war with Zarkon was finally won, things simply seemed to fall back in to place comfortably for them. Hunk and Lance were both eager to return to their families and tell them about everything that had happened, and Allura had been excited to learn more about Earth culture. And, perhaps, the idea of meeting Lance’s family had her a little excited, too, she had admitted to Pidge as they prepared for their arrival. Pidge had been excited over the prospect of seeing her own family again, but had also been pumped at the idea of settling down for a little bit. While her years in space had done very little to quell her thirst for knowledge or adventure, it had taught her that there could be adventure in the more mundane things, too.

And, as fate would have it, Keith being her partner certainly helped with keeping her on her toes.

The two had fallen for each other over time, through swapped secrets and an odd courtship dance that Lance insisted proved them to both be more akin to sloths than humans. Regardless of how or when, the two ended up becoming committed to one another and she had never looked back. There were rough patches and tough times – as there were with every relationship, if anyone was ever honest – but the good times far outweighed them. She felt like she could rely on Keith in a way that she never thought would matter so much. He was supportive when she was right but also brazen enough to call her on it when she wasn’t. And she, in turn, tried her best to offer him the same courtesy. There was a certain level of comfort and a strong emotional intimacy that came from that aspect of their relationship.

And as they settled into a more domestic life, she realized just how much he meant to her and how much she wanted to make that clear to him. Her plan was an easy one for her, as far as she could tell. She drafted out a few blueprints and rough designs during boring meetings with the Garrison commanders to discuss what type of role Earth would have in the coalition. She’d never done something quite like this, but she figured it wouldn’t be too much of a challenge with her attention to detail.

From there it was simply a matter of tracking down the pieces she would need. Hunk was a reliable resource in that subject, as he had a laundry list of opinions with factual evidence and sound reasoning behind it. She had been thoroughly impressed with his attention to detail when he sent her his list and explained how he had sorted all the information. While he hadn’t done any color-coding or official number-based ranking system, his notes about why each item was in its location more than made up for it. Further more, it turned out that Lance had an uncle whose wife’s younger brother could help her out with a few of the cosmetic aspects, so she had him getting a custom stencil designed and shipped out as well. She got Hunk’s permission to have all the parts shipped to his address and then, once she was ready, he’d bring them by for her to begin her work.

 Thankfully enough, about two weeks after the parts came in, her chance arose.

 Keith was still working decently close with the Blade of Marmora, and they had requested his presence as an upcoming conference with the other higher-up Blade commanders to discuss suspicious activity. Something about a potential Pro-Zarkon faction trying to lead a coup against the newly-appointed Emperor that was replacing the previous line. The minute he’d told her about the situation, she’d sent an email to Hunk to send the parts in, so they’d arrive just before he left. That way she’d just have to keep them hidden for a day or two at most. Keith had looked unsure as he slipped on his coat, the plan being that he’d be away with the Blade helping them figure this out with the coalition for at least a week, maybe a few days out if things didn’t go well. “Are you sure you’re okay with me going? We haven’t even been back on Earth for a full month yet and I’ll ready having to duck back out,” He said worriedly.

“Oh, I’ll find ways to keep myself entertained,” She said playfully, shrugging and straightening the collar of his jacket, “given there are still some repairs to be done around the house. I’ll see if I can’t finish those up with the help of my Rovers so we can go look at paint swatches and stuff once you get back.” He blinked then smiled at her, chuckling and nodding.

The two of them had picked a nice, comfy fixer-upper as their first house – a gift from the government for all they’d done to protect the Earth over the years – more because Pidge had wanted a project than a mutual interest in rebuilding. Originally, their real estate agent had thought Keith was the one eager to make repairs and the face Keith had made when he asked what kind of things he was willing to work on had been priceless. For Keith, his interest was more in giving the house the touches that would make it their own, which was great because Pidge was terrible with interior design aspects. She was pretty sure the agent’s head had nearly imploded when he realized who wanted to do what for their new home. And while she trusted Keith’s keen eye for detail, they’d agreed that they’d pick out everything as a team to assure they were both happy with it.

Keith gave her a quick peck, picked up his backpack, and headed out with a wave.

The minute she saw his ship in the sky from their backyard, she tore off to the garage where all her equipment was at. Once inside, she clicked a little remote hanging on the wall that turned on the overhead fan and light, then another button further down that would activate her small four-Rover squad of drones. She had gone ahead and programmed them with information about home repair and modified the tractor beam functions on them to be able to carry up to sixty pounds each without it overworking their systems or the tractor apparatus itself. “Good morning, boys! Ready to get to work!” She beamed, setting the remote back in its holder and settling her hands on her hips. All four raced to her, whirling in what she could only call excitement, and giggled when the one that glowed a pale orange gently bumped against her cheek as if to nuzzle her.

While they were called her Rover squad, they all had different names and colors than the original Rover had. The pale orange one was called Cuddles, as he was an affectionate little bot. Another one, that glowed a dark blue hue, was called Hiccups because randomly his light would flicker dimmer or brighter; Pidge had checked and all the mechanisms of him were in tip-top shape, it was just a little individual quirk that gave him some character, she surmised. The third drone glowed with a luminous red and had been named Cherry Bomb, both because of its color and how it seemed to enjoy following Keith around the most. The last one was named Lady, which glowed with a pale purple, because she was the most regal and composed of them all. Pidge had even made a little bow that attached to the top of the drone, just to help with the aesthetic. “Okay, team, it’s go time! Cuddles, I want you working with me in here. There’s a lot of equipment I won’t necessarily be able to carry on my own so I’ll need your tractor beam to help,” She said with a smile.

Cuddles whirled in excitement, bopping her cheek again, before hovering over to her work bench.

“Princess, I want you to keep these two in line with the repairs inside. First, I need you three to re-cock the toilet in the front bathroom. Right now it’s a little wonky and I worry it could be a huge problem if we leave it alone. After that, I need you guys to replace the filters in the central air unit. They were looking a little gross when I checked them a few days ago. Then I need you three to tighten the pipe under the kitchen sink because it’s been leaking and that’s a waste of water,” She ticked off with her fingers. She figured starting them off with the easier repairs would be good practice to make sure they knew what they were doing. “I’ll assign you guys some more stuff once those tasks are completed, okay?”

Princess whirled excitedly before she, Cherry Bomb and Hiccups hovered out into the main house.

Pidge grinned before running a hand through her hair, fishing a hair tie from her pocket, and starting to tug her hair back. “Okay, Cuddles, let’s see what we’ve got to work with,” She mused lightly, walking over to a pile covered in a dark blue tarp she’d bought at the hardware store. When Keith had asked her about what was inside she had bluffed and said that it supplies for the house repairs. He had opted against checking it out for himself, most likely concerned that she would then try to rope him into assisting with it all. She pulled out the frame then looked over the blueprints again while Cuddles brought over her tool box and the cinder blocks that the whole thing would need to be hoisted up on during most of the work.

It wasn’t an easy task by any stretch of the imagination, but by the end of the week it was ready for the final paint job. The rest of the Rover squad had luckily enough finished the rest of the house work that had needed to be done – only requiring Pidge to help out once when they accidentally broke the door of the fridge – so she had them help her make sure the paint job was immaculate. She assigned Cherry Bomb as lookout, to make sure Keith didn’t go into the garage and see it before the paint had a chance to finish drying, and she headed back in to the house to take care of some more basic chores. She started the laundry because their bedding was covered in grease and oil and sweat. She hadn’t much seen a point in tidying up too much while working on her surprise for him until it was done, as that just seemed impractical. What was the point of washing up completely when she’d get just as filthy the next day?

Regardless, she had started the washer and assigned switching the loads to Cuddles.

After that, she had Princess help her clean up the kitchen, which had been in surprisingly rough shape. She’d mostly survived on sandwiches and bags of chips, since they were easy things to ingest and took less time from her work. She had also used the kitchen sink for any and all washing of equipment or pieces, leaving the whole thing covered in thick layers of grime and clumps of oil. She had even been forced to take the garbage disposal apart to remove a tiny screw that ended up lodged in! She had then purged the fridge – which had already been pretty empty, since Keith typically did the grocery shopping – of what was left that had expired in the time between. In the end, a jug of water, half a carton of orange juice, three apples, a stick of butter and half a package of sliced cheese was all that remained.

She had Hiccups work out a grocery list for use the next morning while also having him set an alarm for her to order some pizza later on.

She then headed to the bathroom and got herself washed up as well. It ended up being a long one with how much muck and grime had been built up over the last couple of days. She used the citrus scented body wash that Matt had gotten her for Christmas because she knew that it was Keith’s favorite. She then took the time to shave her legs and thoroughly towel off before scampering off to get dressed. She opted to go for a plain black t-shirt and a green skater skirt before making her way down the hall, the sounds of life carrying up to her.

“Hey there, buddy, what’s up?” Keith said, a confused but amused tone to his voice that brought a smile to her face as she watched Cherry Bomb spin in circles around the dark haired man, whirling as loud as he ever had. Pidge still didn’t know why, exactly, the little drone had imprinted on her man like it had, but it had and Keith had always seemed kind of flattered by it. He treated the drones like his own overly-affectionate kitten, which had certainly been endearing to her.

The little drone stopped and pushed up into his cheek much like Cuddles was prone to doing. “He just missed you a whole lot,” She laughed as she walked over.

He perked up and grinned at her, indigo eyes seeming a bit lighter with his delight at seeing her. He had reached up with one hand to affectionately pat Cherry Bomb. “Hey, you,” He greeted, reaching out to her with his other hand.

She eagerly stepped into his grip, leaning up to press a small kiss to his lips. “Hey yourself,” She mused happily. Hiccups came floating in, letting out a quiet whining noise. “You hungry?”

His eyes widened a bit in surprise. “You went to the store and made dinner?” He asked.

“Nope,” She grinned, “but I know how to dial a phone to get a pizza delivered. That sound good?” She offered.

He laughed lightly and shook his head. “Sometimes I wonder how you survive when I’m not around. Though I guess this means you’ve been working on something pretty big while I was gone,” He mused lightly.

She grinned widely and pulled back a bit, walking over to lightly tap two knuckles against the door leading to the garage. “I was, actually. Wanna see the finished product?”

“Oh, man. It’s not that Idiot Tracker you were raving about wanting to make two weeks ago, is it?” He asked with a small laugh.

“Oh, please. If I want to design that, I’ll need to be around Iverson to make sure it works,” She scoffed as she twisted the knob and pushed the door open. She beamed when she was that the tarp had been pulled back over it. Cherry Bomb was going to get some kind of great reward for taking extra precautions for the sake of the surprise. She cleared her throat and stepped in front of the tarp, setting one hand on top of it. “Ladies, gentlemen, esteemed guests that occasionally respond to the affectionate name of cotton candy butt.”

“I would like to add the addendum that I only responded to that name because I was completely blitzed on alien booze,” He said calmly, holding up one finger.

“Duly noted,” She said with a snort before turning her attention back to the tarp, “but, back to the matter at hand. Anyway, it is with great pride and enthusiasm that I, Pidge Gunderson or Katie Holt, as your mileage may vary, present this little project that I have completed. I would first like to thank the pit team that helped make this possible. Cuddles, Cherry Bomb, Hiccups and Princess; without the four of you, none of this would be possible.” She said, gesturing to the three floating drones with a grand sweeping motion.

All four of them whirled and twirled giddily at the praise, earning a small chuckle out of Keith.

“And now, my esteemed guest, feast your eyes on this,” She all but sang before tearing the tarp off and waving it a bit like a matador’s cape, stepping back as she did to give the full effect.

Her grin widened as did Keith’s eyes as he drank in the sight, cautiously taking a few steps forward to reach out and touch one of the throttles.

“Hopefully you like it. I designed it myself and had the Rover Squad help me put it together from the frame up. It’s probably not as thorough a design as the one you built yourself was, but it sounds like it runs pretty well and I’d be more than happy to make any modifications as necessary,” She prattled, trying to keep from sounding too anxious about his opinion. Keith said nothing, instead tossing one leg over the other side to settle down on the leather seat. “And I hope the colors I picked were alright, too. I know red has typically been your signature color, but I thought that the black would be a bit more sleek looking. Besides, you know, you were the Black Paladin at the end there.” She continued, carefully tucking her arms behind her back and rocking on her feet.

His hands tightened on the throttles and twisted, the bike roaring to life loud and proud in response. He laughed excitedly and she grinned, glad he seemed to enjoy it so much. He stayed put as it roared back down and looked at her, eyes large and gleaming in affection. “You seriously built this just for me?” He asked.

She smiled and nodded. “Hunk helped me make sure the design was right and that I ordered the best parts, but it was mostly me. I remembered how bummed you were that the Garrison ransacked your old shack and sold your hover bike as spare parts, so I figured this would be something practical for you,” She mused lightly, shifting to start folding up the tarp.

“Have you tried her out on the street yet?” He asked, reaching back to stroke the shimmering design painted on to the back. Where the “01” had been painted on his own bike, Pidge had instead put on a gleaming shamrock with the words “Lucky Striker” etches in graceful silver cursive.

“Nah, I just made sure she started up and everything. I figured that you’d want to take it out for the first ride,” She pointed out, setting the folded tarp on top of her work bench.

“Instead of pizza, let’s go out and see how well she handles on the streets,” Keith said, carefully sliding forward a bit and patting the back of the seat. His grin became a bit playful as Pidge eyed him curiously. “Come on, we can make a night of it.”

She chuckled. “Okay, let me just go put on some leggings and shoes,” She said before heading to the door. She paused in the doorway, glancing back over her shoulder and beaming at how enamored Keith was with the mechanical beauty beneath him. “Damn, I am good at this whole gift giving thing.” She mumbled to herself before scampering off.


	18. Impulsive

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pidge may not be the biggest fan of the Blade of Marmora, but sometimes it’s fun tagging along with Keith for the thrill of it all.

Some days, Pidge wondered if working with the Blade was really worth it.

The Blade missions weren’t always the best options, and more times than not Team Voltron wasn’t particularly keen on taking on their tasks. She, however, enjoyed the occasional seat-of-the-pants ride into Hell. She never told Shiro that she was taking those assignments – ducking behind the excuse of wanting to make a quick pop-in with Olkari – and would then run off with Keith to do whatever task the Blade had in mind. More times than not, the missions she was accompanying Keith on were half-formed, barely developed ideas from Blade members that ranked higher than Keith but lower than Kolivan; usually acts meant bring attention to them in hopes of promotion and esteem, according to how Keith told it.

The most recent incident had her pulse pounding in her ears. She had designed a pipe bomb to be used on a small Galran outpost used to transfer data between the fleets. It was specifically designated to POWs with exceptionally useful skills or trade secrets, which they thought would be extremely helpful to their cause. Finding some of the most intelligent tactical and innovative minds in the galaxy, liberating them from their slavery under Zarkon, and then offering them the chance to use their skills against their captors? It was a brilliant scheme that would work out well for them regardless of if the freed individuals joined the coalition or not.

If they did, they had access to the ultimate ways to destroy some of the Galras most influential weapons. If not, they had still saved another life from Galra tyranny.

Keith had been sent in alone to get the data from the ship with the plan being that Pidge and Green would pick him up before the whole place went completely sky-high. There had been some kind of issue involving an upped amount of sentries and he’d narrowly managed to dart into Green’s maw. They had made to bail out, but a small fleet had been sent out after them.

The fleet was hungry for the chance to take out a Paladin, evidently, as they stayed hot on their heels, firing like it was going out of style. “Damnit!” Pidge hissed, sending Green twirling through a string of debris. Keith swore, nearly dropping the long-distance detonator. “Do  _not_  drop that! If it goes off too soon it’ll take us out with it!” She snapped at him.

“What the  _Hell_  kind of pipe bomb did you  _design_?” He sputtered back, clutching at the head rest of her pilot’s seat while pressing the detonator against his chest for additional safe keeping.

“The kind that will completely fuck their shit up! Now wait for my signal!” She barked back, glancing briefly at him and then looking back around. If she backtracked, she could fly back past the post and, as long as they were spot-on with their timing, they could successfully use the blast to help send them spiraling the rest of the way from the area.

Keith’s communicator pinged lightly. “Hey, Keithenstein, how are you guys? Green’s got herself a fun little game of cat and mouse going, so me and Adwru can come and get you if you need a new ride!” Nihaar called into the device.

“Hey, Nihaar. I’ve already got Ole’ Keithenstein in the Green Paddie Wagon,” Pidge called back over her shoulder, turning Green around and firing three quick shots from the tail laser.

“ _Don’t_  call me that! Between her and Adwru, they’ve already got  _half_  the Blade trainees convinced that’s my  _actual_  name!” Keith huffed back angrily.

“Howdy hey, Pidgey! Good shot there with the laser!” Nihaar laughed back as one of the fleet ships spun out, the entire wing smoldering and sparking.

“Thanks!” She called back, pulling down and skimming the top of the facilities with Green’s claws.

“What are the two of you doing?” Adwru chimed in, sounding frantic and uneasy. Pidge could see he and Nihaar’s ship floating just out of the detonation range.

“Don’t worry, I have a plan!” Pidge called back before looking at Keith. He perked up then smirked, understanding exactly what it was she meant. With a quick glance through the monitors, he flicked the switched.

She realized, as Green was sent tumbling through open space, that perhaps they should have waited just a little bit longer to set off that bomb. The paint on Green’s back flanks would probably be seared clean off and be left in desperate need of a new paint job. Then again, all the Lions needed a new paint job, so that was nothing new.

“Probably should have waited,” Keith commented as they stopped spinning as much, both his hands now clutched at the seat.

“Yup. Guess we can chalk it up to a learning experience?” She asked with a small chuckle.

“Good point,” He laughed, reaching down to lightly squeeze her shoulder. She beamed up at him in return.


	19. Honor Before Reason

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "He had known that there would be consequences for his actions, but hadn’t cared much. It was a matter of honor and protection, as he saw it, and those things came first."

He growled lowly at the hands balled tightly along the back of his shirt, keeping him from getting too far away. He had known that there would be consequences for his actions, but hadn’t cared much. It was a matter of honor and protection, as he saw it, and those things came first. His captor gave him a shove between his shoulder blades, forcing him to look up again. “Which one is it, kid?” They growled at him angrily.

He glanced over at them, trying to glare in defiance but the task difficult with how his right eye hurt, before spitting a bit of blood on the ground beside him. The other gave him a rough shake and he winced. He lifted his head to figure out how to mislead him from his home but his heart leapt into his throat. “Mom,” He choked out, trying to run forward but being held up by the middle-aged man clutching at his shirt.

There, arms crossed and a look of pure murder on her face, stood his mother, on the sidewalk leading to their house. “Get your paws off my kid, bub, or we’re going to have ourselves a real issue,” She snapped, taking a step forward.

“Considering what your little brat did? Beating the tar out of my kid?” The man barked back.

Her steps were measured and controlled, her arms unfurling as she strode to them. “From what my other kids are telling me, it sounds more like you don’t know how to keep you’re too lazy to keep your aggressive little monster on his leash. Now let go of my kid before I bust your nose,” She snarled lowly.

The guy growled and shoved him away, letting him stumble to short distance into his mom. She wrapped her arms around him to help steady him, being careful with him. He glanced up and swallowed nervously. “Mom, listen,” He stared to say but she gave his shoulders a squeeze and nudged him to move past her.

“Kaden, go inside and wash your face. I’ll be in shortly to take care of you,” She said. Despite the calm quality of her tone, he knew it was a façade. She hadn’t turned her head to look at him, instead holding the other adult’s eye with a steely determination he typically only saw when she was developing new security technology or helping him build model planes.

He scowled before darting down past the neighbor’s house and to the front door. He could see his younger brother and sister, their faces pressed up against the glass of the front room window, watching the two adults with acute interest. He growled, walked inside, and slammed the door behind him. “I told you I could handle it, Newt!” He shouted at the two of them angrily.

Newt dropped from the windowsill to sit properly on the couch, eying his brother with a small scowl. “Uh, you’re welcome. That could have been a lot worse if me and Aria didn’t come back to tell Mom what happened! If he just showed up at the door and started yelling, she would never have believed the truth about what happened!” He barked back, using more logic than the average six year old tended to in an argument. Then again, he had inherited their mother’s keen intellect and their father’s poor timing on when to put his positive qualities to use.

“Do you really think I’m stupid enough to lead that guy back to our house?” He growled.

“Uh, considering you were willing to throw yourself at a guy two times bigger and dumber than you? Yes, I do! Mom said that if there were other kids bothering us to tell her or Dad and they’d deal with it. And where would you have led him to anyway?” Newt questioned, his own voice starting to rise in his frustration.

“I would have figured something out! That kid deserved what he got!” Kaden snapped back angrily.

“Your face is all bloody, though,” Aria chimed in, her bright green eyes wide in a mix of horror and guilt. She clutched her precious plush dinosaur, Muffin, tighter to herself as she curled further into the couch. “I’m sorry, Kaden. This is all my fault.”

“It’s not your fault another kid decided to be a jerk and needed to get his butt handed to him! He shouldn’t have shoved you off your bike in the first place!” He insisted, wiping at his nose and upper lip with one hand. It came back covered in a scarlet smear, come of it wet and some of it flaky and dried.

“If I hadn’t been so close to their house, though, they wouldn’t have gotten mad at me. And then you wouldn’t be all banged up,” She said meekly.

“Ari’s right. I mean, have you seen yourself? You look like they dragged you around by a rope on their bikes!” Newt chimed back in, indicating Kaden’s form with a flail of his arm.

“I may have gotten a couple of bumps and bruises of my own, but I messed them up even worse. That’s part of the reason their dad was so mad,” He scoffed back flatly.

The younger boy sighed and flopped back against the couch, throwing his arms out dramatically as he did. “Nice going, Kaden! You should have just gotten Mom, like I told you!”

Kaden growled, fists clenched at his side, then darted up the stairs. He slammed the bathroom door and clicked the lock into place before setting to the task of cleaning up his face. He grabbed one of the little wash clothes hanging from the towel rank next to the tub in a dark green color, simply so that he wouldn’t have to see how badly the rag would be stained. He then pulled a small step stool over so he could more easily reach the sink.

He glanced at himself in the mirror and froze up. There was a bump starting to appear on the left corner of his forehead, skirting along the edge of his hairline. There was a decently sized scrape between the developing bump and his left eyebrow; not deep enough to leak blood but enough so that the blood almost seemed to just hover over the damaged area  His right eye was already swelling up pretty bad and he expected he’d lose sight from it for a good couple of days. He knew that his bottom lip was split, was pretty sure his nose was bruised but not broken, and there were scrapes all along his cheeks and chins. He sighed and turned on the tap to hot, testing the water and mixing it with the cold water to make it lukewarm. Scrubbing his face with the wash cloth wasn’t completely miserable, but he ended up reopening a couple of the deeper scrapes and cuts as he did.

He had just set the wash cloth down on the edge of the counter when there was a knock on the door. “You still in there, hun?” His mother called.

He took a deep breath as he prepared himself to be read the riot act for his disobedience. He unlocked the door then went and sat down on the toilet while she let herself in. He glanced at her briefly, then scowled and glared down at the white bath mat beside the tub. She watched him for a moment before walking over to the sink and rummaging through the shelves behind the mirror.

She settled on the edge of the tub, a first aid kit in her lap, and motioned that he turn to face her. He lifted his head but kept his eyes anywhere but on her. “So,” She said, her tone much softer than it had been outside, “Newt and Aria already told me what happened. Anything you want to add?”

“I’m not saying I’m sorry to anyone. If Chad had just left Ari alone I wouldn’t have had to do anything,” He said, refusing to let his tone waver in front of her.

“Newt says you’ve had beef with this kid before,” His mother said, still calm, as she popped open the first aid kit and started looking through for whatever she needed. She pulled out a small bottle of peroxide and a few cotton swab.

“He’s a jerk with a big mouth but that doesn’t mean I wanted to fight him. Newt is a jerk with a big mouth and I don’t want to fight him. At least not on a regular basis, anyway,” He said, mumbling the last part a bit quieter.

She laughed as she carefully dampened the cotton swab with the peroxide, causing him to look at her for the first time in surprise. “Well, you aren’t wrong, but we’ll keep that to ourselves. Now, tell me the whole situation with this Chad kid? I want to make sure that telling off his dad was well warranted,” She said, reaching up and starting to lightly wipe at some of the smaller cuts on cheeks.

Chad was a bigger kid with a mouth to match. He was twelve years old but he acted more like Kaden’s bossy friend Raya, who was eight just like Kaden himself. Unlike Raya, who had the redeeming quality of being a good sport about teasing and genuinely caring about the others around her. Chad, however, seemed to only like having his friends around so he had someone to show off to. He’d tried picking fights with Kaden and his friends before, but he seemed to know not to push him too much.

While he wasn’t a thug by any stretch, Kaden knew how to defend himself. Both his parents had a lot of experience with hand-to-hand combat and knew that, sometimes, getting physical was the only way to get bullies to back off. As such, they had taught him some defensive moves and techniques. Newt had just started to learn himself, but Ari was too young at the age of four and also lacked any kind of interest in learning. The boys had been forced to transfer schools a few months prior due to Kaden breaking the nose of an older kid that was bullying Newt after the school staff refused to do anything to help the younger boy. The taunting had gone on for weeks and multiple incidents had occurred in front of playground monitors, but nothing had been done.

His parents had taught Kaden the moves with the point being made that he should only use those moves when absolutely necessary. He had gotten a playground monitor every time something happened between Newt and his bully, but they never listened. It was on that fateful day, when the bully had shoved Newt off of a swing and caused him to smack his head hard against the ground, that he had launched himself at the older boy for justice. The school had planned to suspend them and their father, furious when he found out what happened, had instead transferred them to a new school. Their mother, equally furious but wanting to make sure the school saw justice on a more social level, had given the full details of the story to a friend of hers who worked for a parenting blog.

Within one week, every parent in town was aware of the school’s negligence, through reading the blog themselves or simply word of mouth.

When they transferred schools, they ended up going to the same school as Raya. They had always known Raya and her family, as her dads were friends with their parents, and she decided to look out for them once they transferred in. She spread the rumor of Kaden’s actions, but had bolstered the story up to make him seem even more skilled and impressive. There were so many different versions of the story with so many different claims that he had no idea how to necessarily keep all the details straight himself.

Regardless, he had himself a reputation as being the Batman of eight year olds in their area.

Chad had wanted to test those claims multiple times. Up until that day, Kaden had resisted the urge to attack the other kid. The most he’d done was threatening to rough him up and sling insults back and forth. That day, however, as they were out riding their bikes, Chad had done too far. He saw Aria riding past, leading their little group with an excited smile on her face, and then shoved a decently sized stick into one of her wheels as she rode past. She’d been sent toppling over, her knees and hands scraped up from catching herself, and started crying immediately. Halfway back to their house, his anger had boiled over. He told Newt to take Aria home to their mom and then went back to deal with Chad himself.

The fight hadn’t lasted long; he pinned the other down and just kept wailing away on him until Chad’s dad had hoisted him off.

His mother hummed as he regaled her with the full history of what had been going on with he and Chad over the last couple weeks. “Any reason why this is the first I’m hearing about all of this?” She asked as she placed a bandage over the scrape above his eyebrow.

“I handled it myself so I didn’t see a point in worrying you about it. I mean, you worried all the time because of the bullying from Frankie before,” He said quietly.

“Sweetheart, I’m your mother; it’s my job to worry. And finding out about these things after they’ve escalated only makes me worry more, because that makes me think you don’t trust me with these things,” She said with a small sigh. She then started closing up the first aid kit.

His stomach dropped at her words and he looked down, staring at the toe of his sneakers as she returned the first aid kit to its shelf. He had been keeping this to himself because he didn’t want her to worry too much. “Do you hate me now?”

She looked at him in surprise before kneeling down to look at him, reaching up to push some of his wild dark tresses out of his face. ‘Why would you think that?” She asked gently.

“Because I made a bad choice. Because I got in a fight when I didn’t need to. Because I made you worry even more,” He mumbled, voice choked up and his eyes starting to water.

She smiled softly at him, reaching up to cup both sides of his face. “Kaden, baby, I don’t hate you. I could never hate you,” She said. He sniffled a little bit but met her gaze. “I may not always like the choice you make, but that doesn’t mean I like or love you any less. You are my son, my first baby, and I’ll always love you with my whole heart.”

“Really?” He sniffled.

“Cross my heart,” She said, moving one hand to make a small X over her heart for added emphasis.

“Even if I did something really bad? Like if I killed someone?” He asked, a small smile starting to turn up on his lips.

She laughed back, glad to see a bit more of his usual spark back. “If it was someone that I liked, I’d be a little upset, but I’d get over it. If it was someone I didn’t like, either, though… Well, I’d help you hide the body. And your dad would probably offer us an alibi if he didn’t like them either,” She teased, pulling him into her arms for a tight hug.

He giggled back, burrowing into her happily, and letting the tense leave his body.


	20. Puny

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> AU featuring Katie the bartender and a mysterious stranger rolling into her dull, small town.

Katie wasn’t necessarily satisfied with her job at The Stale Ale, the only bar in town, but it was a way to pay the bills. She had been living in the small, dull mountain town of Kerberos for nearly three years and been at the bar since she got there. She’d come here because the idea of college hadn’t been appealing but she’d needed some sense of independence from her family. Her parents had been terribly disappointed with her admission that she wasn’t going to take the scholarships or go to college right away, insisting that she would be wasting her time if she didn’t go for a degree. Her brother, Matt, had been much better about it, saying that he understood that she needed to take time for herself to reflect on what she really wanted out of life. She hadn’t spoken to her parents much since she moved but she did keep up with Matt as regularly as she could. He was, after all, busy with his own life.

And living in Kerberos and working at the bar certainly weren’t helping.

Every night was the same; the same faces, the same incidents, the same cleaning tasks and the same shifts. It was all so routine and expected that it felt like she was even more lost than she was three years ago. She ducked back behind the bar after taking the construction workers that came in every Friday night their first round of cheap, draft beer, tossed the serving tray on top of the stack, and pulled up her cutting board to get started on slicing some limes. A quick check of the clock showed that it was a quarter to eight, meaning that the bowling league guys would be showing up for their nightly round of pool and beer soon. It’d be best to have the limes ready to go before they arrived, simply to make her life easier.

The bell above the front door chimed lightly and an unfamiliar figure hovered in the doorway.

She cocked her head as the tall figure made their way to the bar itself, sliding into a bar stool and motioning him over with a small nod of his head. The first thing that caught her eye was the leather riding jacket and hunched shoulders, his arms seeming to be hidden within the front pockets of his jacket. “You got any food here?” He asked, blowing a few strands of his inky bangs out of his eyes.

“Depends on what you’re looking for,” She said, leaning her arms against the counter. He shifted back a bit in his seat, seeming to pull a little bit closer to himself.

“Do you have, like, some kind of fish?” He huffed.

She quirked an eyebrow then shrugged. “We have a tuna salad sandwich. Would that work for you?”

“Can I just get a plate of the tuna salad stuff? Like, no bread or anything extra, just the fishy part? Oh, and a little cup of milk?” He asked, glancing down as if to check his boots and then back up.

She frowned a bit. “Not interested in something a little more… Typical of a place like this?” She asked, gesturing around her with one hand.

He pinned her with a bland look before shaking his head. “When you put it like that, I guess I’ll take a beer, too. Whatever you’ve got that’s on tap and won’t have me spilling my guts out later,” He said evenly.

“Whatever you say, chief,” She said, giving him a quick salute before turning and heading to the back of the kitchen.

Gomez, the line cook, perked up as she made her way over to the fridge where he kept most of his supplies. “What are you looking for, Kat?” He asked calmly, walking over and leaning against the counter beside it.

“Got a weirdo out there that, get this, wants a beer, milk, and a plate of just tuna mix. Mind grabbing me a plate?” She asked, grabbing the container of tuna salad mix and the open carton of milk. She had one in the mini fridge up behind the bar for certain mixed drinks, but she hadn’t had to open it yet and wanted to prolong it. Once it was opened, she had to remark the labels on it for freshness.

“Yeesh, sounds like a real odd ball. If he starts acting like a total freak, remember to grab the bat we keep up there. It still hanging on the hooks right underneath?” He asked, opening the container and scooping out some of the tuna to plop on a plate. He offered it to her once she had poured some milk into a small cup.

“Thanks for the reminder, Gomez,” She said with a small laugh. The bat was supposed to be a deterrent for any potential robbers, though she didn’t exactly see the point. After all, if someone came at her with a gun, they’d probably be able to shot before she could land any decent blows with the bat.

She took the plate and glass back out to the bar, peering around the guy at the bar to see the bowling guys had come in and were starting to rack the balls at their table. She set the two down in front of the stranger and turned back to the long line of beers, grabbing a frosty mug and holding it up to the nozzle. “Never seen you around here before. Just passing through or planning to stick around?” She called over her shoulder as she prepared the beer.

“Not planning to stay here too terribly long; just got some business to sort out and then I’ll probably be moving along again,” He said, his jacket making noise as he moved.

She had just turned around to set down the beer when he eyes fell to the small, sickly looking fuzz ball now set on the bar counter.

“What is that?” She asked, setting the mug down and watching as he set the little gremlin down on the plate, watching it sniff at the tuna before licking at it cautiously.

“What, never seen a kitten before?” He scoffed, reaching down to carefully stroke down along its little spine with his index and middle fingers. Tiny, rumbly purrs could be heard as the kitten started going to town on the tuna.

“That thing is a kitten? But it looks so… Puny,” She said as she picked up another serving tray and started preparing the beers for the pool players.

“It was half dead on the side of a road, so it’s probably a bit on the frail side. Doesn’t mean it isn’t a kitten,” He scoffed, picking up his beer with his other hand and taking a swig. He made a face before setting it down and returning his attention to the kitten. “But I take it you’ve been here a while?”

“Excuse me?” She asked in surprise as she picked up the tray.

He looked over his shoulder at the pool table and then over at the tray in her hands. “You seem to have a regular schedule around here,” He commented.

She scowled a bit and waved a hand. “Something like that, I guess,” She said before heading over to the table.

The guys greeted her with their usual loud, unified shout of her name. Sampson made his weekly pass at her, complimenting how her work pants fit on her using highly vulgar terminology. Andrew apologized for Sampson, the beaten down little brother that all overgrown frat boys seemed to have, and slipped her a few extra bucks as an additional apology. Derek was on another one of his tirades about the government tapping phone lines while Kyle, a retired cop, told him that he was just being paranoid and had delusions of grandeur. She made sure to leave the small dish of sliced limes beside the ashtray on the windowsill, knowing full well that Derek would most likely end up knocking them over, regardless of location, before the night was done.

She returned and stared down at the brown and white mottled thing still resting on the plate. It had lapped up a decent amount of the tuna mix and was now lapping at a little bit of the milk. “I swear, that thing looks like a gremlin, no matter how you dice it. Oh, and in response to your comment about me having a schedule, so what if I do? I’ve been here for three years so it makes sense that I’d know what to expect by now,” She said.

“Sounds like this place is pretty dull,” He commented, leaning a little bit more on the counter. He kept one arm curled around the plate to assure his furry companion couldn’t run off to far. “Oh, and thanks for the name suggestion. Gismo will be a great name, regardless of what gender this little thing ends up being.”

She laughed lightly. “If you came to Kerberos in the hopes of adventure and excitement, then you really didn’t do any homework before moving out here. This place has been exactly the same since I showed up. I mean, not even a forest fire or car accident has happened in all my years here, and it’s honestly ridiculously infuriating. It’s like this place is trapped in the Twilight Zone or its own pocket dimension or something like that. First interesting thing to happen here since I came out here has been you showing up with that thing,”

“Sounds like a real hoot. Wish Kolivan had warned me about that before he convinced me to head on out here, then,” He scoffed.

“Your brother or something, I take it?”

“Old friend of my mom’s. He runs a mechanics shop here in town,”

“Yeah, I’m well aware of who Kolivan is. He’s the only mechanic here in town, if he hadn’t mentioned that. I know Trent and Glen up and quit on him last week, though,” She said back. Kolivan was one of the few people in town that wasn’t ear-bleedingly obnoxious or mind-numbingly boring. The man had a lot of interesting stories about all the odd jobs he’d worked over the years that he liked to share when he came by to have a few drinks. He could also play a mean game of darts, which she appreciated.

“Yeah, and Harris put in his two weeks a few days after they left,” The stranger snorted.

“Well that was expected. Ever since him and Theresa tied the knot he and I have been making wagers on how long they’d stick around for; looks like he owes me a sweet twenty bucks. Theresa has always hated this place and doesn’t think it’s a good enough place to raise children,” She said while wiping out a glass with a clean rag.

“Don’t blame her for that opinion. I mean, this place doesn’t even have a school, does it?”

“Not an official one, no,” She said, setting the mug in the clean rack. She then grabbed another mug and started cleaning another. “I mean, Claire offers some classes at her place, but it’s far from a structured curriculum. And since she’d be the only one teaching, it’s limited to whatever she actually knows enough about to teach.”

“Sounds like a real party down in this little town,” He scoffed lightly, chugging the rest of his beer. She took the mug and refilled it for him before taking another tray of beers out to the construction workers, then stopped by the pool table to clean up the spilled remnants of squeezed limes from the floor. “So if it’s so miserable and dull here, why do you stay?” He asked when she settled back behind the counter, the kitten nuzzled into his cupped hand, snoozing with its tiny head resting on his fingers.

“What?”

“I asked why you’re still here. I mean, you seem like a smart girl with plenty of potential. Why stay in a place that seems dedicated to stunting people’s development?” He asked.

She frowned slightly as she pondered the question. It was one she’d thought over herself, in the quiet moments in her apartment as she chased sleep like a starving lion on a young gazelle. She had been hoping that life in a small town would give her clarity, give her a taste of real hard work and accomplishment that would answer all the questions she’d been asking herself. At first, she had been thrilled at getting to enjoy the small town experience. There was something charming about having everyone remember her name and what she wanted, and being able to learn the same things about them. But once she hit six months and it felt like every day was the exact same as the one before it, she started to feel the irritation kicking up.

But her pride kept her from leaving. That would be admitting her decision had been wrong, but she didn’t exactly feel that way, either.

“I guess I’m just waiting to see if anything new happens that motivates me to leave,” She said with a  small shrug, making sure to keep up her poker face. She didn’t need a stranger making fun of her ambivalence to the sorry state of her own life.

“Well, if you ever need your car looked at, ask for Keith over at Kolivan’s. I’m sure you’ll be seeing me a lot in the weeks to follow, so you may as well know my name,” He said, taking the last swig of his beer and then standing.

“If you ever need a drink, just come ask your dear Uncle Katie here,” She said lightly while taking away the now empty mug. He chuckled a bit as he carefully settled the hand with the kitten into the pocket of his jacket.

“I’ll keep that in mind,” He said, waving back with his free hand and heading out. She watched him go, then turned her attention back to preparing the round of whiskey shots she knew the pool players would want. Maybe something good was starting with the arrival of this strange young mechanic rolling into town.


	21. Action Figure

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Coran has a set of gifts for the Paladins to help boost morale. They have a few… Concerns, to say the least.

They’d all been settled in the castle kitchen, nibbling on some almost-brownies Hunk had made and swapping stories when Coran came stumbling in with a decently sized box in his hands. He dropped the box in the center of the table, leaned on it, and grinned widely at them all. “So, Paladins,” He drawled happily, lightly rapping his fingers along the top of the box, “how would you all like a little treat?”

“That depends… Normally your ‘treats’ involve really terrible feats be accomplished first. Like that time you promised us all a day off but first we had to survive a six consecutive rounds of combat against the gladiator drones on their highest setting,” Hunk said wearily, taking a suspicious sip of his milk.

“Personally I believed that the training experience itself was a wonderful treat,” Allura chimed in.

“Yeah, that’s because you’re a nut when it comes to running drills and exercises. Even before you were an piloting a Lion you rode us like a cowboy on a bucking bronco at a rodeo,” Pidge scoffed with a roll of her eyes. She then paused and glanced over at Keith. “Which reminds you, have you ever been to a rodeo before? I mean, you grew up in Texas, yeah?”

He shrugged. “I grew up there in a lot of my younger years but, after age nine, I was kind of a ward of the Garrison,” He explained.

She hummed thoughtfully before Coran cleared his throat to get their attention again. “I believe I asked a question,” He said with a dainty sniff.

“I’m sure we’ll all be happy with whatever you’ve brought for us, Coran,” Shiro said with a small smile.

Coran beamed before starting to open the box. “Well, I’m sure you all remember those phenomenal shows we put on a while back?” He mused.

“You mean the ones were you flanderized us all into stereotypes that could be seen as demeaning and degrading to us as individuals, thus making a mockery of the contributions we make to the team on an everyday basis?” Hunk asked flatly, licking a smearing of chocolate from his thumb. All eyes swiveled to him and he perked up in surprise, an anxious smile starting to turn up on his lips. “Oh, uh, I mean, those shows where we got a bunch of new additions to the coalition?”

“And you almost got us all killed because you had some weird brain slug or whatever?” Lance asked before taking another bite of his brownie.

Keith cocked his head and looked at Pidge expectantly. “Wait, what is that all about? Why didn’t you tell me about this?”

She shrugged. “It was while you were more focused on working with the Blade. You were a little too busy to keep up with at the time aside from the big conference calls to discuss orders and mission specifics,”

“Ah,” He agreed with a nod.

“Anyway,” Coran said as he popped open the flaps, “the show was such a hit that we were selling holocaster recordings of it!”

Hunk seemed to pale at that. “Oh, great, so now a whole chunk of the universe thinks I’m just some goofy slob,” He whined.

“Hey, at least you won’t be looked at like a complete idiot by any life form with a basic grasp of the logistics of space travel,” Pidge quipped back.

“Excuse me,” Allura said calmly, holding up one hand, “but I think  _I_  got the shortest end of this deal out of all of us.”

Silence fell at the table for a moment before they all turned back to Coran. “So, uh, what does this have to do with the show?” Lance asked.

Coran brightened significantly at the question. “Glad you should ask, Lance! See, since the recordings were selling so well, Bii-Boh-Bi and I decided that producing merchandise would be a great idea! All the proceeds are used to help fund the rebellion, of course, but it’s been going very well! We’ve sold shirts, hats, stickers, even undergarments!” He said enthusiastically. He then began rummaging through the box excitedly. “We have also sold action figures of all five Lions of Voltron, toy versions of the bayards and a slew of other toys! But this, here, are the prototypes of the latest addition!”

And, with a dramatic flair, he produced a figurine donning the Black Paladin armor.

And the table immediately erupted into laughter.

“Oh, my God! Did they give Tiny Shiro  _steroids_? He looks like two Shiros combined!” Pidge wheezed out, throwing herself back against her chair. Indeed the figurine had rippling muscles… That were significantly more pronounced than the actual Shiro.

“It’s a  _Double Stuffed Shiro_!” Lance gasped, exchanging a look with Pidge and Hunk, before all three erupted into even more ludicrous laughter. Allura looked a bit confused, but was still giggling a bit behind one hand. Keith was looking between the stone figure of Real Shiro and Figurine Shiro, lip between his teeth, trying as hard as he could to not laugh outright.

Coran frowned a bit. “Well, perhaps it looks better in the alternate outfit? It comes with a second costume composed of that really phenomenal black shirt you wore that one time,” Coran suggested, starting to rummage through the box to find the accessory.

“ _No_! No, the figure it fine in the Paladin armor!” Shiro snapped, his brain finally seeming to catch up with what was going on around him.

“Forget what he says! Change it into the shirt, Coran!” Lance all but shrieked.

“Yes!” Pidge hissed out in delirious glee.

“Do it! Do it!” Hunk agreed.

“Why don’t we look at some of the others?” Shiro barked quickly, trying to plaster on a polite smile but the edges coming off just a bit too forced.

“Well, that would be a good idea! As I said, these are just prototypes, so Bii-Boh-Bi wanted to get some feedback to make sure they’re as accurate as possible,” He said, setting the Shiro figure next to the box and beginning to rummage through for another one.

Lance swiped the actions figure up and began messing with it, posing it this way and that. “Fear not, innocent creatures of the universe! Shiro the Hero and his loyal Team Voltron are here to protect you!” He declared, dropping his voice a few octaves to try and imitate Shiro, while making the figure flex.

Laughter echoed again at the table, a crimson hue beginning to creep up along Shiro’s face as he swiped the toy from Lance’s grasp, but then paused to Coran pulled out the next figure.

And then it started all over again.

“It looks like they put Lance’s face under a magnified glass!” Hunk cackled.

“I’m  _melting_ , I’m  _melting_!” Pidge squealed, throwing herself against the table for an added dramatic effect.

“Ding dong, the witch is dead~!” Keith suddenly sang, snickering at the nasty glare he got from Lance in response.

“Which old witch~?” Hunk joined in.

“The wicked witch~!” Shiro added, a hush falling for a second before everyone except Lance and Coran started howling yet again.

“It’s not  _that_  bad!” Lance protested, swiping the figure from Coran’s hand and looking it over. He opened his mouth to say something, one of his hands waving side to side in the air, then closed it. He then dropped the figure on the table and pulled the box over to himself. “Okay, okay, that’s enough about me! Let’s see what some of these other ones look like!”

“ _Excuse you_!” Coran huffed indignantly.

Lance growled then perked up, freezing for a moment before pulling out a figure of white and yellow. “Oh, Hunk, buddy. I’m so,  _so_  sorry,” He said quietly, slowly turning the action figure to face the other Paladins.

Laughter paused for a moment before Hunk reached out, taking the figure from Lance’s grasp. He stared at it for a moment before taking a deep breath and adjusting the face so that it was staring up at the light above their heads. “All around me are familiar face, worn places, worn out faces~!” He belted out.

Shiro, Lance and Pidge started howling while Allura and Keith exchanged confused glances. Keith merely shrugged at her, showing he had no idea what they all found so funny either. “I think it’s another one of those meme things they like,” He mouthed.

“Oh,” She mouthed back.

“But seriously, they made my figure look like I am just ready for death. Like, I’ve given up on everything, no more of this living junk. Totally overrated,” Hunk explained, snickering as he waved his actions figure in the air.

Lance snickered before reaching into the bag again, a sharp bark of laughter escaping him as he grabbed another one. “Well would you look at  _this_!” He said with a laugh, pulling out a figure of white and green. He cleared his throat before turning it to face the rest of the team. “Have you guys seen my pocket protector anywhere?” He asked, making his voice as nasally as possible and even trying to add a lisp.

Keith clamped one hand over his mouth, trying so hard to restrict the laughs vibrating in his chest, while Hunk guffawed like no other. Allura and Shiro settled into quieter laughter, both seeming to gauge Pidge’s reaction before being too vocal. Pidge herself actually snorted a bit, taking the figure and looking it over curiously. After a moment she tossed the action figure over her shoulder, batted her eyelashes, and said in her best Steve Urkel impression, “Did  _I_  do  _that_?”

The other humans at the table were sent into another bout of rowdy cackling. Allura chuckled but was still clearly baffled as to what the joke fully was.

“Okay, we’ve only got Keith’s left,” Lance said, rummaging through the box again once he’d settled down.

The boy in question perked up, brow furrowing. “How did they make a figure of me? I didn’t participate in the show,” He pointed out.

“No, you didn’t, but that doesn’t mean we didn’t have a stand in for your part,” Allura said with a quiet groan.

“Tah-Dah~!” Lance sang as he produced the very silver-haired, very Altean and very beautiful Keith figurine to the others at the table.

“Wait, what?” Keith asked in alarm.

“Hey, Allura said it herself; she got the short end of the stick in the ice show compared to the rest of us.  _She_  got stuck having to play  _you_ ,” Lance laughed loudly.

“I only hope that I was able to give you the complexity you deserve, Keith,” Allura said, her grin becoming something more teasing and mischievous.

“Don’t worry, I gave her a few pointers and coached her into the role, to insure the integrity of your character,” Pidge laughed. She and Allura exchanged sly smirks.

“I’m Keith, I’m  _so_  emo~!” They chimed in unison before dissolving into giggles.

He blinked then smirked a bit himself. “So then, if Allura is actually Keith, does that mean you two are dating now?” He asked, indicating the two of them.

“I suppose so. Sorry for stealing your girlfriend,” Allura mused, tossing a strand of hair over her shoulder and winking playfully.

Keith put on a fake scowl and looked down at Pidge. “How could you?”

“Hey, it’s not technically cheating since I just went from you to you,” She snickered back. She then shrugged lightly and indicated the other woman with a sweep of one hand. “And, honestly, can you blame me?  _You_  just have such a lovely figure that you can’t even  _compete_!”

“Thanks, sweetheart,” Allura crooned playfully, blowing Pidge a kiss.

“Aw, just speaking the truth, sugarlump!” She laughed back, pretending to catch the kiss and pressing it to her cheek.

Keith snickered before looking over at Allura. “You  _sure_  you want to take on the responsibility of being in a relationship with that thing? Garbage gremlins can be wily little creatures to date,”

“ _Excuse you_ , we prefer the term ‘compost cretins’, you  _bigot_. See, this is why I had to leave you for you!” She said playfully, throwing her hands up in the air in mock-frustration.

The whole table erupted back into laughter while Coran pinched the bridge of his nose. Sometimes he wondered if these Paladins were really worth all the effort.


	22. Star Stuff

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ties back to Day 17 fill but stands on its own fine. Keith takes advantage of a cat nap to put a plan in to action to hopefully relieve his wife of some stress.

He was careful as he crept back inside after the trip to the store. While she hadn’t always been a light sleeper, in more recent days she was. “Pidge?” He whispered as he poked his head into the living room. A quick glance showed her settled on the couch, passed out and snoring lightly. He blinked then chuckled lightly. He grabbed a spare blanket from the linen closet and carefully draped it over her, making sure his movements were slow and gentle to avoid disturbing her.

In the last few weeks, Pidge had been dealing with a lot. Her work load had picked up a bit and the deadlines kept jumping around like it was going out of style. It drove him crazy watching as she ran herself ragged between trying to finish analyzing calculations and finalizing schematics only to then be told that she needed to start focusing on an entirely separated project with drastically different specifications, more Excel spreadsheets open on her computer than he could count from over her shoulder. He had thought that by doing her work independent of any specific organization, she’d have more flexibility in regards to her deadlines and schedule, but evidently not. Between the work nonsense, the work that needed to be done around the house, and figuring out specifics about this or that with her family, he’d noticed how drained she’d been. She was a workaholic and sleep didn’t come easy to her when she had a lot of things to take care of. Adding on the fact she wasn’t drinking coffee, and that made for a very tired young woman that was just barely managing to keep herself composed.

And, being a pretty good husband, in his opinion, Keith decided he wanted to try and take some of the burden off of her.

Once he was certain she was asleep, he hid the things he’d picked up at the store in the spare room closet, then scampered off to the garage and made a beeline for her worktable. Beside it was a large case with a combination lock on it. A few quick shifts of his thumb had the lock undone – the combination being well-known to him – and the four little drones inside flickered to life. “Good morning, Rover Squad,” He said with a bright grin.

The Rover Squad, as they decided to call them, was a small team of four Galran drones that Pidge had hijacked and reprogrammed, much like she had with the late robo-legend the squads name came from, to work for her. Cherry Bomb was probably his favorite, simply because it was the one that listened and liked him the best. He was one the gleamed red and whirled its most excited little noises when he was around. Cherry Bomb launched himself from their container and nudged against Keith’s cheek lightly. “Good to see you, too, buddy,” He laughed while gently patting the little robot.

Princess hovered out next, her purple light and matching bow standing out in the dim light of the garage. Her whirl was a bit more curious, as if to ask him about why he’d woken them up instead of Pidge. “Hello, Princess. Weren’t expecting to see me, were you?” He teased lightly.

Hiccups came barreling out next, his whirl almost seeming accusatory as he waved back and forth in the space in front of Keith’s face. His blue light was shining brightly but Keith was sure it would flicker back out in a second or two, as he was prone to doing. It was a personality quirk, Pidge insisted, but sometimes he wondered if it was just a sign that Hiccups was defective. “Calm down, Hiccups. Nothing bad happened, I just need you four to help me with something,” He explained.

Cuddles, an orange glowing drone, whirled and hovered over as well. He reached out and gently patted the side of the drone, receiving a happy chirp-like noise in response. Cuddles reminded Keith a lot of a puppy; eager for attention and affection, regardless of who was offering it to him. “I’m sure you four have noticed that Pidge has been really busy and tired lately, right?” He asked.

All four chimed in agreement.

“Well, I want to do something nice to make her feel better. She’s asleep right now, so we’re going to need to do as much as quickly as we can, okay?”

They all whirled enthusiastically, getting a small grin from Keith.

“Okay, here’s my plan. First things first, I need all four of you to help me finish clearing out the rest of the stuff from the spare room. We can move all the workout equipment and other big stuff into the basement, where I cleared a space. After that, Princess and Hiccups, I want you two to start up the prep work. I’ve already picked everything up that we’ll need for this to all go over well. While you two are doing that, Cherry Bomb is going to have to help me finish up the final touches for a little addition Pidge mentioned wanting. Cuddles, I want you to keep an eye on Pidge as our lookout. If she isn’t already awake by then, it’ll be your job to make sure we know when she is,” He explained calmly.

All four made some kind of noise in understanding and they headed off.

The spare room had originally been planned to be a workout room for them, and had even been loaded up with weights and the few machines they’d picked up, but between their respective work schedules it became more of a pack room. Two spare televisions they’d had, the love seat they’d replaced with a larger couch in the living room, and a small cot they’d got just in case they needed it were also shoved into the small room, making it near impossible to use the equipment. Thankfully, between Keith and the tractor lasers on the four drones, none of the items were too terribly heavy and they made progress relatively quick.

The only problem they encountered was that, much like his lights, Hiccups tractor beam would also flicker out.

And it did on the last item, causing one end of the treadmill to crash down on the floor just as they rounded the corner from the staircase.

Keith’s eyes widened and he glared at Hiccups, the little robot bopping from side to side and making a mocking-apology noise. He knew it well because it had been directed at him many times before. Evidently, anything that was associated with the color blue had a bone to pick with the man for one reason or another. “Keith? Is that you?” Pidge called, voice still raspy with sleep.

“Yeah, just give me a second,” He called back, carefully setting down the end of the treadmill he’d been carrying. As he walked past Hiccups he pointed at him and shook his head, making his displeasure known. Cherry Bomb bumped into the other drone and made a displeased whirl of his own. Keith smirked a bit as he headed into the other room. Pidge was sitting up and rubbing at her eyes with the heels of her hands. “Have a nice cat nap?” He asked as he approached, leaning against the back of the couch.

She hummed lightly before flopping back against the couch, blowing air through her lips and causing them to sputter. “As good as to be expected when you fall asleep on the couch. I used to be able to nap on this thing like a pro, but now? I could be going crazy but it just feels really lumpy and it’s hard to get comfortable,” She grumbled back.

“Did you want to take a nap upstairs in the bedroom?” He suggested. It wouldn’t be ideal for his plan, but he would rather have her close to the action and comfy.

“I shouldn’t. I still need to verify the scouting range on those new cruisers that the Garrison have been working on,” She said with a small huff, starting to carefully push herself into a slightly more proper sitting position.

“If you’re still tired, the Garrison can wait. They certainly had no problem making you wait over a year for the chance to prove they were full of shit about what happened to your dad and Matt,” He pointed out calmly.

She pondered for a moment before smirking a bit herself. “You know what? You’re right. I think a nap in the bed sounds like a great idea,” She said, holding up one hand for his help getting up. He smiled and eagerly offered it, helping to hoist her back up on her feet and following her to the stairs. He figured that he could try standing in the way and she wouldn’t notice the treadmill just sitting in the middle of the hall like it belonged there. He was surprised to see that the treadmill was actually gone completely, the door to the basement cracked ever so slightly when he looked past the banister. “Did you want to come lie down with me? I wouldn’t be opposed to the company.” She mused.

He turned and flashed her a shy smile. “I’d really like to, but I need to finish checking over some encrypted files Kolivan sent me. The target they’ve been following is actually using symbols from Earth so he was hoping that I could figure out what they’re saying,” He bluffed. While he still worked closely with the Blade, he hadn’t gotten much in the way of work from them recently. Given that Keith had made it very clear that he wasn’t keen on the idea of leaving orbit at present time, he wasn’t really of much use to the current Blade investigation.

She rolled her eyes and shook her head. “When aren’t they forcing you to do this or that for them? Well, if you change your mind, you know where I’ll be,” She said, waving her hand lightly as she made her way upstairs.

“Get some rest,” He said before turning his attention back to the cracked basement door. He could see a faint orange and red glow through the small sliver, the two drones waiting for their cue to come back out. Once he saw her disappear into the hallway leading to the master bedroom, he motioned them over with a wave of one hand. They both hurried over to him, both bopping lightly against his cheek. He chuckled and reached up to pat them each. “Good job hiding, you two. Are Princess and Hiccups back up there already?” He asked.

Cuddles whirled in agreement.

“Perfect. Okay, Cuddles, I want you to go help them finish starting up on the prep work. Everything you’ll need will be in the closet. Oh, and make sure to put the tarp down first. It’ll protect the carpet from getting totally mutilated,” He said evenly. Then, just as Cuddles moves to leave, he held up his hand as another thought struck him. “Oh! And make sure to open the window in there to get some circulation going. There should be a fan in there to use, too, to help with keeping the smell under control.”

The little drone whirled, spinning in a happy circle, and then disappeared upstairs.

He then turned his attention the Cherry Bomb, whom was almost shaking in his excitement. “Okay, buddy, let’s get to the really fun part,” He said with a grin, heading for the garage.

He held the door open as the little robot rushed past him, using his tractor beam to start taking down the things Keith was going to need to get started.

Given his long time spent in the Garrison, his service on Team Voltron, the many missions he’d completed with the Blade, as well as how many years he’d spent around the Holt family, Keith had gotten pretty good at building or repairing tech. He still wasn’t as skilled as Pidge was but he wasn’t a novice, either. Her project blueprints hadn’t been too terribly hard to follow, but he’d still consulted with Samuel and Matt to make sure he was understanding it. It was less an issue of understanding what she was going for and more an issue of her handwriting and coding system occasionally being too sloppy to follow.

As meticulous as she could be, it was sometimes the haphazard way that she put things together that really threw her opponents for a loop. It was admittedly something he had always admired and adored about her, but he did acknowledge that it could sometimes be a bit of a hindrance. It had been Samuel that suggested enlisting the help of her drone team with putting the device together. “I’d be willing to wager that she’d already programmed some of the specifics of this design into the drones, to assure they can help her once she has the time to work on it herself,” Samuel had said, offering the blueprint back to Keith, “so that’d be a good option. I doubt you’ll need them all, but it isn’t as if you can’t have them help with some of the other stuff.”

And Keith was grateful for it, really, because Pidge’s workstation was a disaster site of nuts and bolts, with seemingly no rhythm or reason behind it. Cherry Bomb knew exactly where each item he needed was as he needed it, which streamlined the process significantly. What he had been worried would take significantly longer only allotted to about two and a half hours’ worth of work. They headed upstairs to do a test run – with Keith pausing to praise the wonderful job the other three drones had done on getting the room ready, even going so far as to clean up after themselves – and he breathed a sigh of relief when it worked. He took another small minute to add a few last minute details of his own and get the device properly hoisted in the one of the corners of the room. He then finished the last check to make sure everything was set up properly and there was no mess, turned the device on, and went to check if she was awake yet.

He poked his head into their room and blinked in surprise when he saw Pidge, propped up with all the pillows, watching House Hunters in the dark. “Did you sleep at all?” He asked in surprise as he headed over to her.

“I slept for a bit. Just woke up about ten minutes ago or so,” She said, trailing off to glance at the clock and verify how long she’d been up.

“How are you feeling?” He asked, walking in further to look at her curiously.

She shrugged. “I feel about as well as to be expected. I’m tired, I’m hungry, I’m uncomfortable… Though, admittedly, less uncomfortable in the bed than on the couch. Probably would have been more comfortable if I had a cuddle buddy, though,” She tsked playfully.

He chuckled and offered her his hand. “Well, I had to withhold for a good reason. Care to see it?”

“Ugh, I’m so sick of looking over reports, Keith,” She said with a tired sigh.

He grinned wider at her. “I actually lied about that. I was doing something completely different and significantly more important, in my opinion,”

She quirked an eyebrow and cautiously took his hand. “Oh?”

“Oh,” He said with a nod, helping her to get up. He then happily led her out of the room and down the hall, the Rover Squad hovering outside of the bedroom door. “And I also had some help.”

Cuddles launched at Pidge eagerly, whirling and chirping like mad, and she laughed lightly, patting at the little drone best as she could with how frantically he was moving. “Well that was sweet of them. Normally only Cherry Bomb wants to listen to you,”

“Well, they knew it was something you’d like, so they decided to work with me,” He mused before carefully turning the knob and shoving the door open. He then stepped aside to let Pidge get a look and go in further.

“Keith,” She gasped quietly as she entered the empty room, looking around in awe. The walls and ceiling had been painted a dark blue-grey color, making the room seem a bit darker and allowing the hologram device to show its stuff. It was set up with a projection similar to the one the Castle of Lions could pull up for navigating, projecting small images of the various planets that Team Voltron had visited in the universe over the years. They all shimmed and shined, creating a low but comforting light in the room. There were also some glow-in-the-dark stars plastered on the walls and ceiling too, just because Keith had thought it’d be cute to include, as a compliment to the projection.

He walked up behind her as she stood in the center of the room, mouth agape and eyes wide with wonder. “You mentioned that you wanted him to share our love for all that cool star stuff, right?” He mused, pressing a small kiss to the top of her head while he wound his arms around her. He gently placed one hand on her swelling belly while the other sought hers out. “I know that you’ve been stressing about not having the nursery ready with the baby shower in two weeks. Hopefully this at least helps alleviate some of your stress?”

She shifted to face him more fully, lightly pressing one hand against the side of his face and kissing him softly. “I love you,” She said with a sigh, her eyes misted a bit with happy tears.

He beamed and kissed her again. “I love you, too,” He mumbled happily, pulling her just a little bit closer.


	23. Brawn

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Here’s a little trick that a lot of people don’t know; you can use a quick flip over the hip to very easily dispatch an enemy,”

If there was one type of mission Pidge hated above any other, it was the ones that went completely awry basically from the word go.

The plan had been a simple prisoner rescue. The planet they were on was called Kuliwlt, which was divided into two separate factions due to a massive civil war. The two factions went by two different names. Those living in the eastern territories – whom had allied themselves with the Galra – were known as Ghuewlt while those living in the western territories were known as Lhuewlt. The Lhuewlt had, once upon a time, been separated from the war due to a third faction previously existing, known as the Chuewlt. The Chuewlt had been working closely with Blade spies and rebel factions. The Ghuewlt had launched an attack against them in retaliation, killing thousands and enslaving the higher ranking members of their society to be used for the Ghuewlt’s own plans. It was Kolivan that had requested the mission of Team Voltron.

“Zarkon was furious about how many plans had been halted by the actions of the Chuewlt. If not for their bravery and sacrifice, many more lives would have been lost than we had already seen,” He explained, there seeming to be an almost guilty look on his face. He then glanced back up at them, his usual mask of indifference sliding back into place. “The least we can do, now that we have the means, is save whomever is left to be saved. And if you’d all be willing to help, we’d be more than grateful.”

And so, as a show of their gratitude for all the help the Blade had offered them, Team Voltron agreed to the mission.

The mission was not nearly as easy or cohesive as they had been hoping it would be and their plans had fallen through almost immediately. The eastern territory of Kuliwlt was a frigid tundra with freezing temperatures and blizzards rampant. Communication channels broke down between the Lions and Blade ships early on once they started seeking out the underground facilities where the enslaved were kept. They ended up ditching the whole team going in and, instead, left Allura and Lance in charge of helping the Blade ships keep the Lhuewlt fighters focused on them while Pidge, Hunk and Shiro went into the base. While they worked on getting inside and touching base with the covert team inside the base figuring out the specifics on locations and the amount of individuals to be rescued.

The minute they managed to get inside, they were swamped by Galran sentries.

“Oh, well this is just  _tons_  of fun!” Hunk snapped as they ducked behind a wall, his bayard shifting to his gun as he tightened his grip on it. He leaned back over and fired a few rounds before ducking back around. “Kolivan couldn’t have mentioned this to us  _sooner_?”

“He did tell us,” Shiro said back, peering briefly around the corner to get a look at the area ahead of them, “that this place was heavily guarded. The Lhuewlt’s have been relying on the captive Chuewlt for a lot of their battle strategy against the Ghuewlt. It’s unlikely that they would be particularly keen on giving up their main sources of tactical information. Now then, what we need to do is get in there and lock ourselves in. That’ll allow us full access to their security cameras and intercom system so that we can get in touch with the team and figure out their movements.”

“Which means we need to get Pidge to the control panel,” Hunk agreed, firing off a few more rounds before turning to look over at her.

She smirked and nodded, pulling her bayard into her own hand and shifting to give Hunk’s shoulder a small pat. “Don’t worry, I got this,” She said before rushing forward.

“Pidge, wait!” Shiro called after her, reaching out to try and pull her back.

The squad of Galran sentries were keyed in on her immediately. She smirked and sent her hook into a bar hanging over head and used it to hoist herself upward, kicking the newest sentry in the head and sending it toppling backwards. She then knocked the gun from another’s hand with a quick sweep of one arm, using her elbow to take the brunt of the force, andd grabbed its extended arm.

_“Here’s a little trick that a lot of people don’t know; you can use a quick flip over the hip to very easily dispatch an enemy,”_

She yanked the arm forward until the side of the sentry was pressed partly against her side, lenaing closer towards her hip.

_“Especially helpful if you’re a bit on the small side, because as long as you’re properly grounded, you’ll have no trouble flipping them,”_

She growled as she spun, using the momentum to knock another sentry down by using the one in her grasp like a mace or battle axe. Two more shots of laser blasts zoomed past her from Hunk, taking another of the sentries out. She shoved the one she’d previously thrown around into another attacker coming for her, then used her bayard again to zap them both, short circuiting them easily enough. She beamed at her handy work then looked back over at Shiro and Hunk. “Okay, you two, come on in! We should be all set to get to work!” She beamed.

Shiro shook his head as he walked in, following her over to the control panel. ‘Where did you learn to do that?” He asked.

She grinned widely. “Keith and I may have given each other a few tips to help out with missions and stuff,” She said with a small shrug.


	24. Brain

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Directly attached to Day 23 fill. “From my experience, the username and password will be a combination of the information provided on the keycard. It’s just a matter of determining what would be used where and how,”

The mission was one that Kolivan had suggested, Nihaar had pushed for further, and a collaboration with Team Voltorn.

The plan was simple enough; Keith, Nihaar and Adwru were to sneak into the base of the Ghuewlt - a Galran-allied faction of natives to the planet of Kuliwlt - and locate information relating to the surviving members of the Chuewlt faction – which had once been allied with the Blade and rebels – for rescue. They needed to determine how many there were, what their ages were, if there were any documents relating to their health status’, and other information such as that. They had been dropped in what used to be the Chuewlt’s territory, to avoid catching the eye of the Ghuewlt, with Nihaar leading them through the muggy rain forest-esque terrain. Nihaar’s mother had been a member of the Chuewlt – killed by the Ghuewlt upon capture – and Nihaar herself was the only remaining Blade Galra with any knowledge in regards to what to expect from the planet’s environment and wildlife.

Before they left, Nihaar and Kolivan had stared at one another in silence, Adwru seeming thoroughily uncomfortable. Keith, however, recognized the spark in both their eyes, having lived through something similar a few months prior upon encountering his Galran mother, Nyrus. “I will be keeping a close eye on your progress through this mission. Do not take any more risks than is absolutely necessary,” Kolivan said, his tone portraying his usual authoritative stance, but his eyes were different. There was a gleam of what Keith could almost call fear in those eyes.

Nihaar scowled at him, the fur on the end of her tail fluffing up a little and her ears tipping back. “I will do whatever it takes to make right the decisions of you and the other senior Blades,”

“Be careful and be prepared,” Kolivan said, his tone almost seeming to waver and crack to reveal some of his concern.

“I know the terrain like the back of my paws; I don’t need your empty praises or reassurances. I have the skills and knowledge to succeed with my team, now can we stop wasting time with your senseless yammering?” She seethed lowly, turning to follow Adwru on to the small ship that would be dropping them at their destination. Keith shrugged a bit at Kolivan before following after her, surprised to see that her usual peppy demeanor returning.

He decided to opt against saying anything outright about the exchange and focused on preparing for the mission, grateful that they had her knowledge to make it through.

Once they crossed the border, Adwru got them into the base with a keycard he stole from a Ghuewlt guard he incapacitated. After that, they headed down to the records room, where the computers cataloging what they needed would be located. Adwru smirked as he pulled the keycard back out of its pouch. “Okay, let’s see if we can’t get into that database,” He grinned, pressing the keycard into a small card reader port on the machine.

It took the card, beeped twice, then spat it back out at them. Nihaar blinked then grimaced, a small mirthless chuckle rumbling from her. “Dude… Adwru… Did you make sure the guard you took out had at least two green X marks on his keycard?” She laughed.

“Of course! I’m not an amateur, Nihaar!” He snapped back while shoving the card back in. It took the card again, beeped twice again, and then spat it back out. He repeated the action twice more before looking at the keycard with a glare and then blinked, a sheepish smile turning up on his lips. “Oh, um, would a scratch through the scan strip cause it to refuse to read?”

She groaned and pinched the bridge of her nose. “Are you  _kidding_  me, Adwru? You had one damn job!” She whined loudly.

“Hey, we can fix this! All we have to do is go find a new guard and steal their keycard!” He insisted frantically. While they bickered, Keith fished the small device they’d brought to port the information over. They would need to have the information on hand for treating the prisoners once they got them on to the Castle of Lions and Blade headquarters. He stuck it into its port, slunk in towards the keybroad, and started clacking away.

_“Most systems with keycards have a manual override setting, in case a keycard is lost, stolen or damaged. Usually you can access them through timing out the card read, or enter a special code,”_

He clacked away for a moment, skimming the screen to see if there was any little area that would allow him to click in. When he saw none, he calmly hit the code that Pidge had taught him opened up the manual override on most Galra computers. The device pinged lightly and a small window popped up.

_“From my experience, the username and password will be a combination of the information provided on the keycard. It’s just a matter of determining what would be used where and how,”_

He took the keycard from Adwru’s flapping hands and examined it curiously. He’d picked up on little tips and tricks with these things, based on the individual’s ranking, heritage and how organic it was. Those, he had noticed, were the big factors that determined where each aspect of the keycard was used and why. He did a quick skim of the card before clacking away at the keys, smirking when the device chimed in a positive note as if opened up to them. “There, we’re in,” He said, looking at the other two stunned Blades with a smug smirk.

Nihaar blinked then grinned widely. “Why thank you, Mr. Gunderson! Your mate’s been teaching you so well!” She beamed, nudging him aside with a bop of her hip to take control of the keyboard. He blushed a bit but didn’t argue with her.


	25. Feudal!AU

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “He wanted to believe what his grandmother had said, about her belief as to why the foreigner behaved the way she did, but it did not settle his mind. He had seen, with his own two eyes, the strange things that this woman could do, the changes that overtook her and made it clear she was anything but human. Regardless of her purpose for being in their village, Akira Kogane watched the Western woman with a sharp eye and kept his blade close at hand. Just in case.”

He had been present at both instances that had sent the whole village into pandemonium.

Akira was not of a high enough standing to know the Shogun’s family particularly well, but his grandmother, Kaoru, was experienced with helping other women through the pains of labor. He attended her visit to the Shogun’s regal and extravagant home on the highest peak of the village as her bodyguard and been in the room when the Shogun’s wife, Emiko, went into labor. He’d been sent to fetch the other mid-wives while Kaoru helped the woman back to her own quarters. He had then stationed himself in the hallway through the whole labor, standing as still as a statute for nearly four hours, waiting for the shrieks of a newborn to echo out.

But the cries never came. Only the broken sobs of Emiko were heard.

When the Shogun himself arrived, his grandmother was exiting the room with the blanketed bundle that should have been wailing, making full use of its young lungs. Instead, it was limp and motionless and covered in a sheet that was completely saturated in blood. If Akira himself had a weaker constitution, he would have been ill; as it stood, he paled and gawked. “There was nothing we could do,” Kaoru explained, her tone somber and quiet, holding the Shogun’s horrified gaze as she spoke. Another sharp shriek echoed from Emiko inside, something that was certainly meant to be words but was far too shattered to understand. “The child had stopped moving even before her water broke. If you have a servant sent to fetch it for me, I shall at least dress the child so you may say your hellos and goodbyes to something more comforting.”

The Shogun took a deep breath, closing his eyes tightly, before slowly opening them as he exhaled. “Yes. Of course. I… May I ask what type of clothing would be best?” He asked, voice choking up a bit at the question.

“Your child was a boy, my Lord. Do with that information as you feel necessary,” Kaoru said before heading off, keeping the small body pressed to her own form. For a moment the Shogun looked mortified and insulted by her seeming indifference, but disappeared into his wife’s chambers without a word more.

Akira followed after her and helped her, a constant presence to help his grandmother as necessary. Kaoru was far from a priestess or healer, but she knew her way around a needle and thread and knew what to expect after having successful had five children of her own, so she was the closest their village had to a medicine maker. And, after having to burying Akira’s parents, two of her other children, several cousins and grandchild from various raids by filthy bandits over the years, as well as narrowly surviving one of those attacks herself, had grown painfully comfortable with dealing with corpses and the severally injured. Akira, in response, had dedicated much of his time to learning to fight and clung to his grandmother as if his life depended on it. He still had two uncles remaining, but neither of them had wanted to pay the fare to send him over the mountains to look after him when his parents had been killed. Kaoru, however, had made the time to collect him herself. Nearly losing her to the raid that occurred in their village two years after his own parents died had terrified him. As he saw it, she was all he had left. He would see to it she lived a long and happy life, only passing on when she was too old to keep going.

After they finished preparing the dead child to be introduced to his parents for the first and last time, she had collapsed into a chair and wept openly. He held her through it all.

In the weeks to follow, as Emiko healed from the injuries of child birth, it became very clear that there was more damage done to her than just the physical. She refused to eat or drink much, refused to spare more than two words at a time to most of the staff or relatives looking after her. Her meals would go untouched for hours or days at a time. Kaoru tried her best to convince the woman to eat, being one of the few people that Emiko would actually speak to, but she refused, too broken hearted and empty inside to ever be fulfilled in any way, shape or form again. He had suggested that they simply force the food down her throat.

Kaoru had flashed him a bland look but had a smile in her voice as she said, “Akira, my darling, that is not the way to help a woman in such a state.”

The Shogun grew increasingly more agitated as word of his wife’s state continued to stagnate, telling him the same tales of starvation. “You should know how to fix this! You have lost more than one child!” He had shouted at Kaoru one day upon hearing the same report.

Kaoru had glared down at him. “I never carried one of my children inside of me dead, my Lord. I lost mine to the actions of monsters in human skin, years after they had grown enough to be away from me. There is a significant difference in our circumstances that you are either unaware of or playing willfully ignorant to,” She retorted calmly.

The Shogun had been rattled by the admission, dipped his head, and apologized. “Is there nothing else that we can try? A medicinal cure for the pain that is ailing her so terribly?” He pleaded.

“If I knew of one, I guarantee that I would make use of it. I am not, however, fully trained as to what medicines or herbs could do such a thing. I am only able to act in accordance with what I myself have experienced and assisted with in the past,” She explained. This seemed to spark something in the Shogun, but he only thanked her for her time and dismissed them both back to their home down in the village proper.

A few weeks later, Akira was offered a job to help build a new house out in the forest for a special guest the Shogun had called upon.

He appreciated having an excuse to leave the Shogun’s house and have a reprieve from the depressing atmosphere of the place, even with the whole task being a bit exhausting. The design for the house was different than the ones they were used to, requiring it to be about twice as big and with walls installed to create several separate rooms, something more akin to a hospital but with another chamber that was clearly meant to be a bedroom. It also came with instructions to place in a small stable, only large enough for maybe one or two horses. It was an odd anomaly of high society and commoner lifestyle that had them all curious as to what its purpose was. The Shogun was adamant that the house needed to be completed before the autumn season rolled in, but had commissioned the job halfway through the summer. The only benefit was that the house was to be built close to the lake, so during their breaks, he and the other men assigned the task would go swimming to wash up and cool off. It was during their breaks that he learned about the gossip circulating the village.

“An omen is what my wife’s mother says it is,” One of the other workers told him, taking a bite of an apple he’d brought with him.

“Omen?” Akira parroted curiously.

“Mmhm. Says that the death of the Shogun’s son was a sign that there is a great calamity coming. Says it only makes sense, given the child was supposed to be born in spring,” He added, wiping some juice from his mouth before taking another bite.

“How does that work?” Laughed another of the workers, one that was a bit closer in age to Akira.

The first worker scowled and pointed his apple at him. “Spring is the best season; the start of a new year and the season that offers us the most in the way of crops and livestock and prey in the forest. It’s always been the best season for births, too. Why you think all my children were born in the spring?” He scoffed. He took another bite of his apple, wiped at the tip of his nose with thumb, then continued on. “The women have always had a theory, you see. Children dying in other seasons when they’re born makes sense. The summers are hot and sticky, so it could be believed that the baby can’t handle being kept too warm and dies. In the winter, it’s the opposite; too cold for them to stay warm so they die. In the autumn, they believe it to be a more instinctive thing. We have to spend a lot of time stockpiling to assure we have plenty of provisions in order to make it through the winter, and we have to be extra cautious when it comes to autumn that we have planned properly. For some families, getting pregnant was far from planned, and in those cases? The child knows that its birth could be death of its whole family and sees to the problem themselves.”

Akira stared, scowling a bit. He doubted that is was something such as that; his late aunt had been born in the autumn, his two remaining uncles had both been born in summer, and his own father had been born in winter. The only member of his family that had been born in spring was his youngest uncle, whom had been killed in a raid, and had always been a bit on the frail side, according to his grandmother. “I’m not so sure,” He said, keeping his tone calm and polite. He carefully rose from his seat and dusted the bits of leaves and dirt from his pants. “I think that, sadly, sometimes these things just happen.”

“It’s been over fifty years since the last time a child was born dead in the spring; there has to be something more going on,” His superstitious associate argued calmly before finishing off his apple. Akira returned to work and avoided join them on the subject again. He wasn’t sure if he believed in omens or warning signs such as that, but he did know that he was doubtful that the death of the Shogun’s child was anything except a tragedy. He’d been by his grandmother’s side when other women had gone through similar pains and nothing worse had come of it. He was convinced they were all just reading too much into the situation.

Or, so he thought, until the second instance that sent the whole village reeling occurred.

He had been sent to inform the Shogun that they’d officially finished building the house. It had taken them occasionally working into the late hours of the evening, struggling to see what they were doing by the low light of torches and the moon, but they’d done it. He had just reached the top of the hill when he a strange figure standing before the gates, waiting for the guards to permit them entry.

The figure was a small thing, their head only reaching to about his shoulder and seeming as frail as a recently hatched bird. Their hair was a strange gold-brown color that had been twisted and tied off into a long braid that hung past their shoulder blades. They shifted so he could see their profile, his brow furrowing at the large honey tinted eyes that locked on to him. He shifted his gaze down, blinking once at the strange outfit they were wearing; an apron over what seemed to be some kind of dress in a light green hue.

It wasn’t like the casual outfits the villagers wore or the intricately designed kimonos the nobles tended to wear. These were the clothes of a foreigner.

They sized him up much the same as he had but then they dared to lift their head and hold his gaze for a full moment, either not catching up on his disgust or choosing to test his limit. “Our Lord will see you now, miss,” The guard chimed in suddenly. Still, she didn’t pull her gaze away from his. A small smirk turned up on her lips and she turned, bowing politely to the guard as she brushed past him, and then headed inside.

He glared after her, wondering what business a foreigner could have with the Shogun. He explained his reason for needing entry to the guard and was let in without a need to clarify. He strode up, catching up with the young foreigner easily, but then picked up his pace a bit to reach the door before them. He was reaching to slide it open when it was thrown open by the Shogun himself, the older man looking a mix of frantically fearful and immeasurably relieved. When he saw it was him, though, he schooled his expression back to something a bit more neutral. “Ah, Akira, it is good to see you. How goes the work?” He asked politely.

“It is the reason that I am here, actually. We have finished the construction and the house is ready for you, my Lord,” He said with a polite bow of his head.

“Splendid, my boy, as its owner has actually just arrived as well,” The Shogun said, turning his attention to the foreigner as they reached the door. Akira looked from the Shogun to the foreigner, an uneasiness starting to creep up through him. “Akira, allow me to introduce you to Lady Pidge Gunderson, a royal healer from across the seas.”

Lady Pidge Gunderson dipped her head, the corners of her mouth seeming to curl in her amusement at the look on Akira’s face. “It is a pleasure to meet you, good sir, and a great honor to be of service to you, Shogun Hiroshima. If I may be so bold as to request this, however, I would prefer to be called simply as Pidge. I have never been one for titles or formalities, you see. I take it that I am not too late in my arrival for the task of which I was requested?” She asked, her voice a light and tinkling sound that Akira couldn’t quite say was pleasant but also wasn’t completely grating like he’d expected. There was an odd accent to it, but she spoke the language surprisingly well.

“Your timing is fine; as Akira tells me, they have completed construction on your home today. Though I do not understand why you seemed so averse to taking up one of the many spare rooms we have here, in my house, seeing as your primary assignment will be the health and treatment of my wife,” Shogun Hiroshima said evenly.

Pidge chuckled a bit, covering her mouth with one hand as she did, and cracked one eye to look up at Shogun Hiroshima. “Forgive me for being so blunt, my Lord, but it is not the primary reason I have come to this village. I simply agreed to the additional assistance that my King requested of me upon my announcement of coming here. Regardless of your desire for my being here, I would have come to this village regardless,” She said, her tone far too casual and calm.

For a moment Akira expected the young foreigner to be beaten dead right there on the steps by Shogun Hiroshima’s guards. Instead, Hiroshima’s smile became tight and he nodded. “I see… Perhaps we could come inside and discuss these matters somewhere a bit more private,” He said, stepping aside and gesturing inward with a sweep of one hand.

“That would be rather suitable, I believe,” Pidge agreed before stepping in.

Shogun Hiroshima turned to Akira, gesturing him in as well. “I shall have a servant inform Kaoru that you are here. For now, Pidge shall be in charge of taking care of my wife, so she may return home with you. We’ve promised a horse and cow for her kindness and dedication over the last few months, so I shall have those brought to your home in the next day or two,” He explained, sliding the door shut once Akira was inside as well.

The younger male blinked a bit in surprise before bowing. “You are far too kind to us, my Lord. Thank you so much,” He said gently. The older male smiled and nodded before heading off. Pidge glanced back at Akira once more over her shoulder, her lips slowly turning back up in a haughty smirk that had him glaring at her, before she turned around and followed after Shogun Hiroshima.

…………………………………………………………………………………………

Things in the village became unnerved and uneasy the longer the foreigner settled in. The Shogun had offered to give her a small staff of servants that could run her errands for her, to assure that she spent as much time as possible with his wife, but she refused. Any time she needed something, she would fetch it herself, and milling about town in her strange foreign clothes with a small basket that she would fill up with this or that.

Then came the disappearing acts, where Pidge would seem to disappear for hours at a time from her responsibilities to Lady Emiko. Multiple times, small groups of guards had been sent down to look for her in the village and forest around them. She always explained that she was out collecting herbs and medicinal weeds that she needed for this or that. The Shogun would tell her, time and again, that she was free to collect what she needed, but she needed to alert someone of where she was going and for how long, or risk suffering consequences for her neglect.

She would always promise to do so. She never did. The Shogun would always remind her that he would punish her insubordination. He never did.

The only reason that the villagers knew as much as they did was because of the things the guards and servants would say when in town. All the guards had expressed frustration with the willful woman from the West, whom refused to follow the orders she was given. The servants expressed issue with her never tidying up her messes or looking out after herself, but then having snapped at the staff before if they attempted to tidied up rooms she had been previously working with. The hardest part, to them, was how Shogun Hiroshima was adamant against speaking out against Pidge’s actions, too desperate to have any chance at helping his wife to risk infuriating the foreign woman serving as his final hope.

 _“To_ abuse _the Shogun’s kindness as she does!”_

_“She is an insolent creature with no heart! Lady Emiko needs help and this healer cares nothing for that! Does she not understand how important it is for Lady Emiko to regain her health and heal from this whole terrible affair?”_

_“What more can be expected? She is a_ foreigner _! She has_ no _regard for how things are done here!”_

 _“We can only hope that what little she is doing is helping Lady Emiko! The_ least _she can do is be competent at what she was_ sent _here to do!”_

These issues, ultimately, boiled down to outrage over, despite having agreed to looking after Lady Emiko and helping to return her to lively young woman she was before, Pidge seemed completely uninterested in looking after Lady Emiko. There had been a handful of incidents where Akira had caught Pidge wandering about in the woods while he was out doing his hunting or foraging, the foreign woman following trails that led to the mountains, her eyes seeming cloudy and focused on something too far away to be seen. She looked like she wanted to sprint off into the mountains and be gone from the village every time.

They’d encountered one another a handful of times in the market and he’d only ever seen her look smug or seem genuinely interested in chatting with Kaoru. The two women had spoken for a while that first day, before Kaoru came home, simply so that his grandmother could tell her of all the things she had tried and observed in regards to Lady Emiko’s condition. When they talked, it was mostly about Lady Emiko, but it seemed that the foreign woman enjoyed getting his grandmother’s feedback.

Then came the rumors that Pidge Gunderson was the bad omen that the death of the first child had foretold.

Pidge had an odd way about here that left everyone in the village scared, and there was evidence to support it. She would occasionally chatter to herself in her native tongue, as well, which was off-putting to anyone that caught her. She would mutter things, glancing around from here to there as she did. Once, another person in the market had bumped into her, jarring her as she tried to walk past. She had grumbled something under her breath, in her home language, and then stormed away. Mere moments later, as the individual was looking through a selection of fruit, one of the legs on the stand had snapped and sent fruit rolling into the guy and dropping on the ground.

Another time, the blacksmith had refused to sell her a small dagger he had on display. She had sighed out something in her native tongue and then left. Later that day, while ironing out the blade of a new tool, he had dropped his clamps on his own foot, burning it severely.

A child that had knocked her over later tripped in a hole and spend a full two weeks bedridden while his ankle healed.

There were more instances that he couldn’t even recall, but those weren’t the things that convinced him that this woman was a danger.

Akira himself had observed odd things involving the young woman himself. Once she had tripped and her things had spilled all over the ground, rolling a bit away. He recalled specifically seeing one item that had been rolling stop, freeze for a second, and then roll back into her hand. What stuck out to him more, however, was the times he caught her wandering around in the forest alone. Whenever her gaze lingered on the mountains, yearning and wide, he had noticed that the smattering of freckles along the bridge of her nose and cheeks seemed to be  _glowing_. He was certain that is wasn’t simply a trick of the light, because the light they produced was far too bright to be explained as anything else, shimmering and twinkling like the stars in the night sky.

He had tried calling out to her once the day before, to make sure she didn’t get herself lost or abandon her work, only for her to whirl around and shout something at him in her native tongue, eyes wild and frantic. When she realized it was him, she took a second to compose herself, uttered a small apology and then hurried away. Seeing her so rattled had been surprising, considering all that he’d learned of her in the short time she’d been in the village, and it left him feeling like she was hiding something.

“Or, Akira,” Kaoru said quietly, looking at a few potatoes in thought, “it could be that she is simply unsure of her place. She is currently living in a land that is not her own, where she is does not know a single soul, with an important assignment placed upon her. She may not realize that her actions are off-putting or offensive to most of the villagers.”

“Grandmother, this is more than a simple case of being uneasy in a new environment!” He insisted as she placed two potatoes in the shopping basket he was carrying. He had been hoping that, by bringing his concerns to her, he might get some insight into how he could prepare if Pidge decided to try something awful on him. “This woman… There is something about her that is not right. I have heard strange stories about things she can do, and seen some of them for myself!”

“I am not interested in the things whispered about by all the mothers in the village, Akira,” She said patiently, pausing to look over a small grouping of carrots. She picked it up, seeming to weigh it as she shifted it from hand to hand, then placed it in the basket as well.

“She is neglecting her duties to Shogun Hiroshima! Lady Emiko has still not yet made a formal reentry into society, nor has Shogun Hiroshima made any public announcements about her condition!”

“Your knowledge comes from the servants and guards that enjoy chatting up the shop keeps around here, does it not?” She asked.

“They are working closely with Pidge and Shogun Hiroshima, in the Shogun’s home. The only source that could prove to be more knowledgeable would be Shogun Hiroshima or Lady Emiko themselves,” He said with a small huff.

She handed a few coins over to the booth keeper before starting to walk over to the next booth, the fresh snow crunching quietly under her feet. The winter thus far had been much kinder than usual, with more days of sun than days of snow and sleet. “Then, may I ask, why you haven’t asked Pidge about these matters yourself? I’m sure if you were polite about it she’s be responsive,” She suggested.

“I could  _never_  ask that woman  _anything_  and receive a straight answer,” He seethed lowly.

“Sounds like quite the difficult sort of woman, Sir Kogane,” The familiar voice of the foreigner chimed behind him. He flinched and whipped around to glare at her. As was expected, she was wearing her usual smirk as she watched him. “You’re still young, though, so I suppose it makes sense. You should certainly hold out hope for a respectable woman, though; I do know Kaoru’s poor heart would be shattered if you ran off with some cheeky little harlot.”

He scowled a bit. “Harlot?” He repeated.

“Ah, my apologies. Sometimes I forget that some of the things I’m used to saying back home aren’t used here. A harlot is a woman of poor reputation or loose morality,” She said, her grin disappearing at her explanation. It turned into a slightly warmer smile as she turned her attention to the older woman beside him. “But how are you doing, Kaoru? It’s been a while since last you and I occurred one another in the market.”

“Indeed it has! I have been a bit busy so Akira has been a darling and doing a good majority of the shopping for me,” She said.

“Kind of him to look after you so,”

“I’ve been blessed with him, to say the least. But how are things going with Lady Emiko? I remember you had mentioned having a technique that might help improve her appetite?”

“Oh, she’s doing a bit better. I have been having her drink a special tea that increases the sensation of her hunger. So far, she’s eating at least one full plate of food a day, so progress is being made,”

“Well, that certainly is better than she was doing! Hopefully she’ll be eating more soon, too!”

“It’s a work in progress, and it will take time, but I think we can get there. My current issue is less an issue of Lady Emiko and more- Ah! Snowing again already?” She cut herself off, perking up in alarm when a small flake landed on her nose. She looked up, holding her hand out, as even more snow began to fall.

Akira lifted his head and blinked a bit in surprise, shielding his eyes with one hand. The thick, grey plumes of clouds hadn’t been there just a minute ago, he swore. Then again, winter always tended to be fickle and unpredictable. Children could be heard excitedly shouting, running out to catch flakes and begin snowball fights.

“Ah, I’d been hoping to get the shopping done before it started back up! Well, we can use the snow to prepare the stew tonight instead of using more from the drinking bucket,” Kaoru commented with a small laugh, shaking her head before turning her attention to the excited children. She then looked over at Akira. “I remember when you were that small, you know. You loved to play in the snow so much. Did it snow much where you lived before, Pidge?”

Both the Kogane’s tensed at the look of sheer horror on Pidge’s face, one of her hands filled with the chilly white powder. She was muttering quietly, her tongue almost seeming to trip over her own words, her hand holding the snow shaking.

“Ah, Pidge, darling,” Kaoru laughed nervously, reaching out to gently tap her shoulder. Akira moved to try and warn her not to, remembering what had happened when he’d done the same a few days prior.

Pidge flinched back, her voice rising and spewing more fragmented thoughts in her native tongue. She went on for a bit longer than they’d seen her in prior incidents before she cut herself off with a sharp gasp, seeming to come back to herself. She dropped the snow as if it had burned her and patted her hands off on the skirt of her dress. “I… My apologies, Kaoru. I’m afraid I’m just a little on edge. You’ll have to forgive me but I should return to my duties before the weather turns any worse,” She said, bowing before scurrying off.

Just on the outskirts of the market she looked up at the clouds, tightened the shawl she was rearing, and took off at a jogging pace towards the Shogun’s house.

“Poor girl must not be from an area that sees a lot of snow, what with how startled she was. I suppose she needs a bit more time to adjust to it all,” Kaoru chimed with a small sigh and shake of her head.

“What kind of land never sees any snow? Grandmother, that girl is  _not human_  and  _cannot_ be _trusted_!” He growled lowly, an uneasy feeling settling in the pit of his stomach. Something about what she’d said, how she had reacted to both the snow and being touched, filled him with dread.

Kaoru sighed and shook her head. “Akira, I have already explained that I do not believe any of the gossip that has been floating about, and neither should you. This girl has given us no reason to be distrustful of her,” She said as she turned and headed along to the next stand, looking to get some good meat for the stew.

He looked at her before looking back over to where the Pidge had disappeared just moments before. He wanted to believe what his grandmother had said, about her belief as to why the foreigner behaved the way she did, but it did not settle his mind. He had seen, with his own two eyes, the strange things that this woman could do, the changes that overtook her and made it clear she was anything but human. Regardless of her purpose for being in their village, Akira Kogane watched the Western woman with a sharp eye and kept his blade close at hand. Just in case.

…………………………………………………………………

Akira Kogane was going to kill Pidge Gunderson and lift this horrendous hex from the town.

Her hex came to pass in the days following the incident at the marketplace. First it was the children that had fallen terrible ill, nine of the younger kids under the age of seven. They had started out with fevers, which was to be expected. All of them had been running around out in the snow, after all, so catching a cold was anticipated. The fevers, however, did not break after a few days like they normally did, and then they started vomiting and speaking in tongues. The language they were using was complete gibberish, but Akira swore it bore some similarities to what Pidge was always muttering to herself.

He also found it interested that, ever since that day, Pidge seemed to have disappeared.

None of the children had died yet, but none of them could hold down food or communicate or go to the restroom on their own. Their symptoms seemed to grow more aggressive as the days ticked by. Their fevers grew worse, their breathing became labored, and they started to vomit even if all they had were small sips of water. He and Kaoru had been horrified when one of the children began foaming at the mouth, their eyes rolling back in the head, and they began convulsing. She had no explanation for what had caused this, horrified as each case grew progressively worse.

And then Kaoru herself caught it.

For a full four days, Akira tried frantically to look after her and find an answer. He read through the small journals she kept to see if any of them could give him answers. He barely slept, woken up frequently by her retching and other symptoms. He had a break down on the third night, running on only five hours of sleep in those three days, desperate for some kind of solution as to what was going on and how to stop it. The fear of losing his grandmother to this mysterious ailment kept him up that night, leaving him trying to figure out what could have caused it.

And then his mind called up the day at the market. And all the pieces seemed to click.

He didn’t tell anyone about his suspicions. He didn’t want the whole village getting up in arms and alerting the foreign creature that they knew what she was. If she had the power to create such a horrific illness, she could certain dispatch an angry mob without a problem. No, what was needed was silence and secrecy. He waited until night, making sure that Kaoru was as comfortable and well-tended before he left as possible. He kissed her hand, smoothed her hair from her sweaty forehead, silently promised to save her, regardless of the cost.

He took his katana – a memento from his parents – and a small smoke bomb. He figured it would be useful, just in case he needed to make a brief retreat at any point in the confrontation. He then headed out toward her house by the lake, certain that she would be there. From what he had come to understand, she never stayed a full night in the Shogun’s home. The time of evening did not matter to her, either, and once she felt her duties for the day had been fulfilled she would leave. He checked the small stable briefly, satisfied when he saw her horse sleeping inside. He peered in through a window but saw no fire or figures inside. He could hear rustling in the trees directly behind him and he leapt inside, moving as quietly as possible and stalking along the shadows.

He pressed himself against the wall and took a deep, quiet breath, hiding under the table and against the wall. There was a rustling as she pushed aside the flap at the front and walked in, letting out a long sigh. She spoke aloud in her native tongue, setting a small basket on the tabletop above him. He moved to the edge of the table, clutching at the handle of his blade in preparation to strike. With a snap of her fingers, the small fire pit in the center of the room suddenly sparked to life. Nodding in satisfaction, she moved over to a shelf overloaded with large pots and pans of various sizes and depths.

It was then that he lunged, throwing all of his weight into her and knocking her down.

A startled cry left her and she started struggling, throwing her arm back and clipping him in the face with her elbow. He grunted but ignored the pain and tingling sensation, already knowing that it was going to be bleeding. He dug one knee into her hip to keep her from moving, seized up her wrists with one hand and pinned them above her, and used the other hand to press the blade of his katana right against the tender flesh of her throat. She stared up at him with wide eyes, stunned and surprised, and he felt pride swell in his chest.

Regardless of whatever she was, demon or cursed spirit or whatever else was possible, he had bested her.

She stared at him for a long moment and slowly her expression became more impressed than startled. “You have beautiful eyes,” She commented.

His eyes widened before he growled and pushed down harder on the blade. “You will die for your crime,” He growled lowly, hand shaking with the effort of not just slitting her throat right then and there.

She blinked once, twice, and before she started to chuckle lightly. She shifted just a bit, seeming unphased by how the blade was so close to splitting open her skin. “I was not aware that issuing compliments was a crime punishable by death,”

He growled and dragged the blade once in warning, enough to break the skin and earn a small whimper from her. Blood began to flow in a slow but steady stream down either side of her neck. The wound wasn’t particularly deep, but he figured it would warn her against speaking out again. “Do not try to play games with me, you demon! You know what crimes I speak of!” He snapped.

“I’m afraid I do not,” She said quietly. She cleared her throat a bit, being careful with how she moved to avoid jostling the new cut. “But I should suggest that you, perhaps, should not come running in here so brazen and bold without a full plan. Or the full knowledge of what you are up against.”

Suddenly, there was something wrapped around his waist and he was yanked off and dragged back outside. He growled and tried hacking at the object with his katana and was surprised to find that it was roots. The roots released him after a moment and he followed them to a large, looming beast made entirely of bark and branches, with patches of moss covering portions of it like fur. It looked like a giant lion made of timber, though it had no mane. Its eyes were made of two luminous golden flowers with white centers that followed his every move. Its claws were like thorns, only much larger and longer, and they dug into the dirt in anticipation. There were small leaves and tiny flowers all over its body, sprouting off of the bark and moss of its body. It opened it’s mouth and roared at him, a sound that called to mind the window through the trees during a storm only much louder.

He scrambled to his feet, preparing to launch himself at the beast, when two roots snapped free of the ground and wrapped around his ankles. “Oak is an extremely loyal forest feline,” Pidge’s voice chimed, walking around to face him. She was sizing him up all over again, he realized, but it was clear that it was of a more calculating gaze. “She will keep you planted in that spot for as long as she should want to and you will be unable to wriggle your way out of her grasp or break those binds. But she will only do that as long as I should want her to.”

Oak, as the creature was called, padded forward and pressed her face into one of Pidge’s hands. In response, Pidge lifted the arm and let the giant plant cat press into her, her fingers stroking the bark above its flower-eyes. It slowly released a sound that he was certain was supposed to be a purr but sounded more like the creaking of loose tree branches in a storm.

“I am not fond of the idea of killing or being killed, though, so I would like to give you the chance to explain yourself. So,” She said, her gaze shifting from her companion back to Akira, “why did you break into my house with the goal of killing me?”

He snarled at her and tried to lunge, but as she said the roots around his ankles kept him pinned in place. “You know why I am here! You’ve placed a hex on the whole village!”

“A hex, you say? I do not recall ever placing any hexes recently, and certainly not on anyone in the village,”

“You are  _lying_! Many of the villagers have encountered troubles after run-ins with you! But this most recent hex, the illness you have caused to spread, is going too far! People could die as a result of your dark magic!” He snapped.

She sucked in a harsh breath then glared. “So there had been an illness? Well, thankfully, I just need to begin brewing the broth that should be able to heal them,” She said, patting Oak’s head twice before stepping away from her. She smiled at him before swiping his katana from his grasp and tossing it over her shoulder, caught in the mouth of her wooden pet. “And I could use an extra set of hands to get everything in order.”

He blinked then glared at her. “You expect me to help you, just like that?”

“For the sake of those afflicted with the illness? Yes, I do,” She said evenly. The roots along his ankles started to loosen a bit, cautious and distrustful of him just as he was of her. He stared at her, holding her gaze, and found eyes bright with determination and sincerity.

“What do you need me to do?” He asked calmly, standing upright and squaring his shoulders.

“I just need someone to help me prepare the ingredients as I put them in the brew and then take them to the village,” She explained. The roots slipped away the rest of the way from his ankles, but he could see Oak’s jaw clench tighter on the katana, as if anticipating an attempt by him to take it back. “I am well aware that the villagers have little love or trust in their hearts for me. I am, however, the only person here that can mix the solution needed to heal the sick. You, though… The villagers have quite a bit of respect and esteem for you, Akira, so if you were to deliver the antidote, they would be eager to accept it. You can tell them whatever you think will be most believable to them, I have no care what they think, but I cannot stand by and let them suffer while I have the skills and knowledge that can help to them.”

He slowly nodded, his mind calling up the thought of Kaoru in her bed, so weak and frail and her mind seeming gone. He understood what she meant about taking action to help others, about the feeling of responsibility do what you can for others. It was why he’d come here in the dead of night to remove the woman that he thought was the cause of all the trouble facing the village.

Seeming satisfied with his response, she turned and headed back into her house. Oak trotted up ahead of him to follow her master, growling in warning and actually slapping his cheek with her vine-like tail. He stepped inside and watched as Pidge began to work, hoisting a leather-bound tome from one of her shelves and motioning here and there with one hand. As she did, objects flew across the room, setting up the cauldron above the flames she’d sparked with a snap and filling it with water from two pails set in the corner. “How are you doing that?” He asked.

Oak shifted to lean against a nearby wall, watching him the whole time, and dropped the katana. She then shifted to rest one of her massive paws over it and dug her nails into the floorboards, as if to drive home the point that she had no interest in letting him take it back. “My skills have reached a point where an incantation isn’t needed for menial tasks such as this,” She explained. She then headed over to another set of shelves and began pulling out a few things wrapped up in what seemed to be paper and string.

Two small cutting boards hovered over to the table along with two knives. “So what, exactly, are you?” He asked uneasily as she approached, her arms filled with the items.

“I am what is referred to as a mage by my people, but yours would be more familiar with the term ‘witch’,” She explained, spreading the items out and beginning to open them. She set two of the ingredients on the cutting boards and indicated the seat beside her with one hand. Once he settled into his seat, she explained to him how he needed to cut the bone and fat from the strange meat and then, after that, cut it into thin strips.

“A witch?” He asked quietly.

She nodded. “Yes. Oak is my familiar, or animal companion,” She said, picking up her own blade and beginning to cut up the plant she had put on her own cutting board.

“She seems to be more than just an animal, if I may be so blunt,”

She laughed. “Yes, she is. Familiars are an extension of a witch’s soul, you see. The first area of magic that I mastered was magic involving nature and plants, hence her element, and the animal I was able to conjure using smoke stories was a lioness, so she became what she is,”

He nodded a bit and settled into the task. As they worked, they slowly continued to talk. He wasn’t sure if they spoke because they wanted to or just to avoid an awkward lapse into silence, but the more they spoke the more he became interested in her. She seemed to have no discomfort or unease in opening up to him and sharing her knowledge with him, despite his attempt on her life earlier that night.

She explained the cause of the illness to him.

“The snow may have seemed normal, but it wasn’t. It was not actually snow, but rather the leftover sulfur of a dragon’s fire,” She explained as she began grinding down some kind of scale-like item in a stone bowl.

“A dragon? I find that hard to believe,” He said evenly.

“This dragon is not indigenous to this area, so this implies that there is more to its arrival here than to be expected. From what my searches turned up, there used to be a small family of dragons that lived here, but they either left or died off about a century ago. This dragon took over their abandoned nest but barely seems to have started a horde, so King Alfor should have an easy time dispatching it and relocating it to a more appropriate location,” She said with a small shrug.

She told him the origins of why she worked with humans.

“My parents and brother were all very passionate about the use of magic to benefit the lives of those that do not have these gifts,” She said as she carefully dropped the dice chunks of meat into the pot. She then returned to the table and started peeling some kind of fruit. “Mythical creatures have always been well hidden by those of us gifted with the skills of a mage, as many mythical creatures cannot be bested through any means available to humans. Father was a member of King Alfor’s Royal Council and convinced him that it would be in the best interests of both our worlds to work in tandem. We could help protect humans from what they cannot easily defend against while humans can teach us more about the technologies you implement in your day-to-day lives.”

“Your father sounds like a compassionate man,” He commented.

“He was,” She agreed, her smile becoming a bit more somber.

“Was?”

“He, my mother and brother were all killed. They were living in a human village that had suffered from an illness similar to this. Upon delivering the cure, the humans turned on them, claiming my family caused the illness themselves solely to gain their trust.”

“…”

“My mother was burned at the stake. Father was publically flogged and stoned. My brother was dropped into the lake with a large, heavy stone tied to his legs,”

“I’m so sorry for your lose,”

“Thank you. Losing them was… Quite unexpected, and I still struggle with the pain some days,” She admitted, pausing in her task to stare down at the peeled fruit. She took a deep breath, setting the knife she’d been peeling with aside briefly, then picked it back up and began to cut the fruit into slivers. “Thankfully enough, King Alfor allows me to take on missions at my own volition, which makes my assignments more enjoyable.”

“Why do you do it?” He asked suddenly, lightly picking at the edge of his own knife with his fingernail. She tilted her head at him and made a small questioning hum. “Help humans, I mean. If humans were the ones that killed your family, why do you continue to work in ways that benefits us?”

“Because they would not want me to be bitter. They would want me to understand that humans fear what they cannot understand, what they cannot control. Death and the unknown are similar in that way, you see, and they are the two biggest things your kind tends to fear. It is what caused their deaths and what cause you to come here with the intent to kill me,” She said with a small shrug before resuming her task.

He stared at her for a moment longer before looking down at the knife in his grasp, the weight of her words forming a heavy stone in his belly.


	26. Arguments

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They’re both stubborn, they’re both bad with feelings, and they’re both bad at communication. Makes sense that, eventually, there’s be a meltdown, right?

He had been dreading returning to her.

Things between them had been tense and unpleasant for too long for him to , ever since Kolivan had announced his plans to retire in the near future. He was starting to try and figure out who he wanted to succeed him; Keith himself was doubtful he’d be chosen, but Adwru seemed convinced he’d be selected. “You’re one of the best here, and he’s always had a soft spot for you. I’d be more surprised if he picked someone else,” He explained.

It was during this pivotal time that Pidge had become a bit more insistent that he return to the Castle of Lions.

“Look, it’s really important,” She had said the first time, eyes bright with excitement. Her grin became a bit more amused as a thought occurred to him. “Besides, you’re missing all the fun of watching Lance freaking out over Allura like a mother hen. The baby is due any day now and he’s being  _super_  overbearing when it comes to her.”

“I’ll see what I can do,” He had said with a small shrug. He noticed how she seemed to deflate at that but opted against commenting on it. “I’ll talk to you later, okay?”

“Yeah, sure,” She said with a scowl before disconnecting the line.

The next two months she kept talking to him almost weekly, harping on him to leave the Blade. Every time he would try to bypass the subject simply because he had a hunch as to why she was being like this; planning their wedding. They had been engaged for nearly a year at the time and, while he’d never pegged her for the type of girl to get overly involved with such things, he supposed it made sense. But right now, he simply couldn’t think about something like that. If it was true that Kolivan was considering him as his replacement then it would be a great opportunity. He’d have more clout to improve the way the Blade treated its members, maybe change the moral to be more geared towards the survival of its members.

After two full months, he insisted on being sent away on a long-term mission, wanting to impress Kolivan with his skills.

He ended up being gone for a whole year on the assignment. Kolivan had praised him for his dedication to their cause but insisted that he return to Team Voltron, mostly to do damage control. “Team Voltron have been very… Hostile towards us, to put it lightly, while you’ve been gone. They were very displeased when we informed them that you would be gone for an undetermined amount of time with no means of communication,” He said.

He’d been mortified and embarrassed, apologizing profusely to Kolivan for the trouble. He then excused himself to go to the Castle of Lions and talk with them. It seemed like Kolivan had wanted to say something else, perhaps to warn him of how furious Pidge had been in her communications with them, but opted against it. He spent the whole flight there twitchy and anxious. He didn’t like this new side to Pidge and with each minute that ticked by, he grew more and more frustrated.

Once he was inside, he made a beeline for her –  _their_  – room, ignoring the calls of the others. Lance had tried to grab his arm to make him stop but he had yanked himself free. He paused to glare at him then turned and continued his trek down the hall. When the door slid open, he found the room to be reorganized and empty of human life, though he could hear the shower in the adjacent bathroom.

The bed was no longer pressed with one side against the wall, but instead had been turned to that only the headboard was against the wall. The dresser was pressed to the opposite wall, and there were a few small knick-knacks on the small table next to Pidge’s side of the bed. He walked closer and picked up the item that first caught his eye, a small star shaped jar of some sort. It had a small pink and white lace ribbon attached to the front of it, complimenting the mint green tint of the jar itself nicely. He shifted it in his hands, moving it this way and that, looking for any kind of engraving to tell him what it was.

“Put. That. Down.  _Now_ ,”

“Good to see you, too, Pidge,” He sneered, setting the small thing down and turning to face her. She was fully dressed, surprisingly enough, but still had a towel around her shoulders.

She scoffed before pulling the towel up and over her head, starting to rub at her hair to dry it more. “What are you doing here?” She spat, speaking louder to be heard through the fabric of the towel.

“What, no pleasant greeting? No ‘I’m so happy to see you’?” He goaded.

“Stop wasting my damn time, Keith, and answer the question,”

He blinked then glared. “Wasting  _your_  time? How about how much of Kolivan’s time you’ve wasted with pestering over whatever inane thing you were blowing up like a big damn deal?”

She tugged the towel down far enough to see him, her own eyes narrowed into a glare. “I had been telling you for weeks that I needed to talk to you. I told you it was important every single time. Going to Kolivan was the only chance to get in touch with you, and I gave up after I found out you took on a mission that took you off base for who knows when,” She snapped back. She yanked the towel from her head then turned and headed back to the bathroom to return it to the towel rack.

“Well, congrats, you got your wish! Now what was this  _oh-so-important_  matter we needed to discuss?” He huffed as he followed after her.

She was folding her towel in preparation for putting it on the rack. “It doesn’t matter anymore.  _So_  sorry to place the expectation of, gee, being able to  _rely_  on you! It’s not like we’ve been together for several years or anything like that!” She said with a flippant wave of one hand before hanging the towel over the rack. She then moved to brush past him.

He grabbed her arm and glared down at him. “So you made me look like an ass to my superiors for  _no fucking reason_?” He snarled.

“There  _was_  a fucking reason, but, like I said, it doesn’t matter now!” She barked, reaching up to shove him out of her way and away from her.

He stumbled back a step but refused to be deterred so easily. “Oh, no, you don’t  _get_ to pull that!  _You owe_   _me_  an explanation after how badly you’ve ruined my chances for the promotion!”

Her head snapped up to meet his gaze faster than he’d ever seen her, and the look on her face screamed murder. If he weren’t just as furious as she was he may have been unnerved by the look. “ _I owe you_  an explanation? Oh, that’s  _fucking_  rich!  _You_ fuck off to do whatever the Hell  _you_  want for a year to get in good with the guys in your glorified fraternity and  _I owe you_   _an explanation_?”

“I did that to make a change! If I take Kolivan’s position, I can  _change_  the way the Blade operates! You know how you  _constantly bitch_  about the risks that come with a mission? How I could be  _left for fucking dead_  by my teammates? I can take steps to put a fucking end to that!”

“Good for you, Keith,  _good for fucking you_. You can go on ahead and run off with them and climb the ranks and get yourself some real clout! You can go ahead and prioritize your career with the Blade over  _every other thing_  in the  _fucking universe_! It’s perhaps your destiny, even! You can be just like-!”

“ _Don’t you fucking dare compare me to her_!” He bellowed, getting as close to her as he could, screaming the words right in her face.

She didn’t waver, though, and held his gaze. “You can be  _just like your mother_ ,” She seethed, lowering her voice, before shoving her fist into his chest. He shifted back, holding up his hands as if to grab her, only to have a small something fall into his palm. He looked down, sucking in a breath, as he stared at the simple gold band with the tiny stone in the center.

The engagement he had given her almost two years ago.

He stood frozen for a moment, snapping back in to reality as she started to storm out the door. “Where are you going?” He called, chasing after her.

“I’m leaving, obviously. I am  _not staying_  here with  _you_  around!” She said, refusing to turn her head to look at him as she walked.

“You’re not going anywhere until we sort this out!”

“ _Sort what out_?” She shrieked, wheeling around to face him as they entered the commons room. Everyone was gathered there, jumping to attention at their entrance. He could see them all watching them from the corner of his eye, their gazes a mix of anxious and fearful. “There’s  _nothing_  to sort out. This… This…  _Whatever_  the Hell we had? It’s  _over_.  _I’m done_. I have no interest in wasting my time further with this. A relationship is supposed to be a partnership, and I  _clearly don’t_ have a partner in you. This isn’t a relationship now and I don’t care enough anymore to work it back in to one.” She lowered her volume and kept her tone even as she spoke. She then turned her attention to the others. “I’m going out. I’ll send coordinates once I get there in case you need me.” She said.

“Of course, Pidge,” Shiro said, blinking out of his temporary daze to focus on what she said.

“Thank you,” She answered before turning and heading back off.

Once she left the room, Shiro quickly ushered the others out, insisting they give Keith some privacy. Lance hesitated, bouncing baby Alfor in his arms, before turning to Allura. “You mind taking him for a bit?” He asked quietly.

She looked from him to Keith, who seemed to be completely lost as the gravity of the situation sunk in, before nodding and reaching for you near-one-year old. “Of course. Just… Be careful with him, Lance,” She said gently as she took him.

“Papa!” Alfor protested loudly, still reaching for his father.

“Hey, it’s okay, buddy. Papa will come play with you in just a little bit. He just needs to have a grown-up talk with his friend first,” He said, reaching out to lightly stroke his son’s cheek, thumb tracing over the pale blue Altean mark on his cheek.

Alfor letting out a small whine but slumped against Allura’s shoulder with a small nod. Lance smiled back and waved as they left the room, waiting until he was sure they were at the end of the hall to speak. “Well, I take it you were hoping that would go better, huh?” He asked, shoving his hands in his pockets and turning to face him.

Keith glanced over at him, glaring weakly, before looking back at the door Pidge had left through. “I don’t understand what the Hell she’s so upset about,” He said quietly.

“Well, that’s… It’s complicated, to say the least,” Lance said as he moved to sit down. He indicated the seat beside him and, slow an unsure, Keith settled into the spot. “I… It’s not my place to tell you everything. And Pidge doesn’t seem keen on the idea of sharing any of it with you now, either. The others think we should stay out of it because it’s a matter between the two of you, that we should respect Pidge’s wishes and leave things to her, but… I can’t do that.” He shifted, pulled his hands from his pockets and dragged them along his jeans. He looked down at his hands and then back up at Keith, his blue eyes soft with sorrow. “I… I can’t stand by and let this happen the way that it is. And not just because I have a kid or you’re my friend, but because I would want to know myself.”

Lance’s words turned over in Keith’s mind, reeling into overdrive, and his eyes widened as pieces started to click together. No, no, that couldn’t be. He couldn’t mean what Keith was fearing he meant. “What are you talking about?” He wheezed out, trying to sound calm but utterly failing. His chest was heaving with panicked breaths already, and his hands started to quake.

Lance took a quiet breath. “I’m talking about your late daughter,”


	27. Departure

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Continuation of Day 26 Prompt fill. Things end. People change. It’s the fact of life. Sometimes the only option you have to to walk away.

Pidge had fled to Kuliwlt to visit Nihaar, as Coran told them. After Kuliwlt, the planet that Nihaar had been born on and raised for her earlier years, had been liberated from the Galra it needed a leader that could resolve the civil unrest and bring the separated factions together. For Nihaar, whom had never felt wanted by the Blade and had a few family members still living on Kuliwlt, the choice to return home and take control was easy. With all the accomplishments she had and how instrumental she’d been in the freeing of the planet, she’d been nearly thrown into the position.

_Pidge tried to get you to come back once she found out she was pregnant. We told her to just tell you during one of her many calls to you, but she was dead-set that wanted to tell you herself in person._

_I wish she had told me… If I had known I would have come back._

_I know, Keith. I know._

He and Nihaar hadn’t kept up much once she left the team, but it didn’t surprise him that she and Pidge still talked. Nihaar had been the member of the Blade that had pushed him to act on his interest in Pidge, after all, and she always appreciated how Team Voltron accepted her so eagerly.

_We finally managed to get her to tell Kolivan she was pregnant so he would send you back, but you were already on your mission at that point. He said that he wouldn’t have been able to reach you even if he wanted to, at that point. Pidge herself gave up on trying to reach you at that point, deciding that she’d just take care of the baby by herself._

_She gave up?_

_As far as she was concerned, you didn’t want to be around. You were more focused on building up your credit with the Blade, and she decided she didn’t really care if that was what you wanted. If you couldn’t come be with her when she sent for you, as she saw it, then you wouldn’t want to be there for the baby either._

He landed just outside the citadel, where there was a forest. He figured it made sense that she would settled down in a spot that, given what she was the Paladin of. It was late in the afternoon, the sun starting to sink lower in the horizon and lighting the sky up with bright orange and yellow and pink hues. It reminded him a lot of the sunsets he’d seen back in the desert, on Earth, and would have been a welcome sight if not for how frigid he felt on the inside.

_Everything was fine at first. She was born healthy and well, and even though she was tired, Pidge was doing great. We were trying to help Pidge out where we could with her, too, to make things a little easier for her. But then… Well, sadly, sometimes these things just happen. It wasn’t anyone’s fault; the baby just… stopped breathing._

_She wasn’t sick? There was no warning?_

_SIDS was the determined cause of death. This happens, sometimes, with babies between the newborn phase and two years old. Their bodies are still adjusting to working on their own, so instinctive things like breathing while sleeping aren’t completely programmed in to them. Their bodies read it as the mind being at rest, so that means all the other systems should be at rest, too, I guess… It’s not as uncommon as people might think, but it’s still uncommon. I don’t even think it was an idea Pidge had ever entertained until it happened._

Green Lion was settled along the tree line at the top of a large hill that overlooked the view. It would be a great spot to enjoy a quiet moment alone. Pidge was settled on the grass, seated with her knees pulled to her chest and her arms wrapped tightly around them. He hadn’t seen that guarded pose from her in years. His heart throbbed painfully in his chest as he reminded himself that he was partially to blame for why she was sitting like that. Nihaar was beside her, speaking softly and her long tail gently draped along her shoulders.

_Pidge completely fell apart for the first couple of weeks afterwards. She would barely eat, didn’t sleep, didn’t clean up. We got Matt to stay with us for a while and she started to get better, started acting more like herself. She told us that she had made a decision that she thought would help her going forward. I assume it was dumping you._

_… Matt was probably happy about that. He’s never thought I was good enough for her._

_I’m not gonna confirm or deny that. Matt made it pretty clear that he has a lot of issue with you, so you might want to avoid any missions that’ll put you in direct contact with him. I’m not sure if he’d try anything, but better safe than sorry, you know?_

He slowly approached, standing a bit behind them and steeling himself. “Haven’t you done enough to me for one day?” She asked with a small sigh.

“Can we talk? In private?” He asked, looking at Nihaar. The ex-Blade in question stared at him then looked over at Pidge. She gave a small nod and Nihaar rose, staring hard at Keith as she moved past him.

She said something quick and harsh in her native tongue, but he couldn’t place it. He merely averted his gaze, listening until the sound of her steps completely disappeared.

“You should have told me about the baby,” He managed to croak out once they were completely alone. He was a bit relieved that he didn’t sound angry, but his pain leaked through.

“I shouldn’t have had to say more than that it was important and I needed you with me. You asked me to marry you, you promised to be there for me, and you weren’t. There’s not much else left to interpret about that, you know,”

“There’s still the matter of us. This… I don’t want it to end like this. I know I’ve done wrong… I know I said things I shouldn’t have… But that doesn’t mean I don’t still love you,”

“I never said I didn’t still love you. But the thing I can’t get over is that I can’t trust you, that I can’t rely on you. I’ve always made it clear to you that I won’t settle for a relationship where I get back what I put in… That I won’t commit to someone who isn’t going to commit to me as well. You’ve proven you can’t be the kind of partner that I want. No amount of love will ever make me settle for less,” She said, a finality in her words and tone that he knew better to press her on.

He was quiet for a moment before he shifted and sat beside her. “Tell me about her,”

She tensed then slowly looked at him. “It won’t change anything. It won’t fix everything between us. It won’t change how I feel,”

“I know,” He said, holding her gaze. It pained him to admit it, but he knew that there was no coming back from this. They had both made mistakes. They had both suffered for it. “I just… I want to know about her, even if she wasn’t here for very long. I want to at least know what our daughter was like.”

Pidge stared at him for a moment before turning her gaze back out to the horizon.

“I named her Amber Rose. She had my eyes, my nose, your hair, your skin… Lance said she had your whiny mouth, but she wasn’t really that bad,”

He laughed a bit at the jab at him. Of course Lance would say that.

“She had just started figuring out how to make faces and noises before she,” She cut herself off, taking in a shuttering breath and resting one hand on the grass, picking at the strands as if to distract herself. He reached out and tentatively placed his hand over hers, squeezing lightly, trying to offer what little comfort she might find in him. She relaxed just a hair at his touch. “She smiled and laughed a lot. She was always so happy, so full of love.”

She told him a little more; about how Amber seemed to like wearing clothes that were in different shades of orange or peach. Pidge still had the blanket that Colleen had knitted for her when she told her parents she was pregnant, folded up in a small container with the first outfit Amber had ever worn, stashed in her closet. The little star on her bedside table was actually the urn with her ashes inside it, kept there because Pidge didn’t want to leave her in a plot on Earth, so far from the only home she’d ever known.

He sat there and listened, laughing when was appropriate and tearing up as he realized that these were things that he would never experience himself. He never had the chance to hold their daughter and he never would. He never had the chance to see her smile or hear her laugh and he never would. She would never learn to talk and they’d never know what her first word would have been. He’d never need to learn how to properly braid hair. He’d never get to attend one of those little Father-Daughter dances he’d heard about.

He would never have those chances.

They sat in silence after a while, watching as the sky turned dark, and staying until the cold grew to be too much for Pidge to bear.

She stood up. He followed her.

She went to the Green Lion. He went towards his Blade cruiser.

He glanced back at her, his fingers tracing the outline of their engagement rings in his pocket. She didn’t spare him a second glance.

She boarded the Green Lion. He boarded his cruiser.

She returned to Team Voltron. He returned to the Blade.

They took on a life of being strangers, the only reminder of their previous involvement being their broken hearts and the remains of the daughter they never had a chance to truly know.


	28. Abandonment

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Life with a newborn can be exhausting. It can also be something that stirs up ones own family troubles.

“Calm down, buddy. It’s okay, I’ve got you,” He cooed, voice soft but scratchy still from sleep.

“Wa…Waaahhh,” Came the insightful response, warbling in volume and whine.

“It’s okay, Kaden, no need for that. Let’s stay quiet, okay? Mommy’s still sleeping-!”

“I’m not, actually, but I appreciate the attempt,” She said with a sleepy puff of laughter, turning on her side to look at him. His eyes were wide in surprise as he gently rocked the fussy infant in his arms. She shifted a bit to sit up, already going for the hook of her nursing tank top with one hand while pushing herself up with the other. “He’s probably just hungry, which makes sense. It’s been almost three hours.”

“I can just go heat up a bottle for him. Get some sleep, Pidge,” He argued gently, pausing briefly in his rocking. He winced when Kaden suddenly chimed in with a loud, short cry of distress. He looked down and resumed the swaying motions immediately. She reached over and gently tapped the lamp on her bedside table twice, so that it only emmited a low glow. “Sorry, sorry. I know you hate it when you aren’t  _part_ of the conversation, but only  _are_  the conversation.”

She laughed a bit as she tugged the left side of her nursing tank top down to expose her breast. “Just hand him here, Keith. I’m already up and it’ll be easier for him to just take straight from the tap than you having to listen to him shriek the whole time you’re making the bottle,” She insisted, holding her arms out expectantly.

With a defeated sigh, Keith shifted to sit on the bed beside her and carefully hand over their one month old son. The little guy cried even louder as he was moved, falling silent briefly as he was cradled in the crook of Pidge’s arm. “Yeah, I heard you, baby. Don’t worry, the booby bar is always open for you,” She cooed teasingly, adjusting her arm to lift Kaden closer to her.

Keith watched and chuckled as Pidge struggled to get Kaden to latch properly, the baby continuing to shove his little fist in front of his mouth every time he tried to attach to her. The little guy let out a sharp indignant squawk at Pidge after the fourth time he got his fist instead of her nipple.

“Listen, dude,” She huffed lightly, using her pinky finger on one hand to nudge his fist out of the way while the rest of that hand held her breast in place for him, “you have to work  _with me_  here. If you keep curling your fist in front of your mouth like that? Yeah, you aren’t gonna be able to get on the booby!”

“Here,” Keith said, leaning over to gently nudge the offending fist with one finger, “let me see if I can’t help out a little.” It took a bit of coaxing, but after a second, Kaden uncurled his fist. With the palm exposed, Keith prodded at it with the tip of his finger, grinning when small and chubby fingers curled around it instead. He then carefully moved his arm using the grip on his finger off to the side.

“ _Thank you_ ,” Pidge sighed, exasperated, as she moved Kaden’s head back up with her arm. This time, his gaping little mouth closed around her breast, silencing him. After a small moment of readjustments, he was properly latched and suckling the milk with small, hungry grunts. “I knew there was a reason I keep you around.” She teased Keith.

He flashed a small smile and hummed quietly, turning his gaze down to their son. “It’s nice to be able to do  _something_  to help you out with him. I feel so useless sometimes, because it always seems like he needs you,” He admitted, his thumb stroking the soft skin on the top of Kaden’s hand.

“Well, he’s still really small, so it kind of figures. In the next few weeks you’ll be able to do a lot more with him, though; especially once he can go longer than two or three hours without eating,” She pointed out with a small smile. She’d done a lot of research to start preparing herself once she found out she was pregnant, to make sure they’d know what to expect with a squalling newborn around, and it showed that more times than not, newborns would tend to be clingier to their mothers. Once they gained a bit more independence around the six to eight week mark, where babies would start getting better control of head movement and figuring out facial expressions, they were less dependent on Mommy.

Keith hummed again, looking down at Kaden with pure adoration. They sat in comfortable silence for a good twenty minutes before Kaden stared to doze off, little eyes fluttering shut and mouth widening in a yawn around the nipple in his mouth. “Looks like someone is a little milk drunk,” He teased, offering to take him.

Pidge smiled as she carefully handed him over, both of them freezing when he opened his eyes wide to stare at them. They had learned that babies were very similar to dinosaurs; if you didn’t move, they couldn’t see you. Or, rather, they wouldn’t really acknowledge that they saw you. They both slowly exhaled as his little eyes dropped shut again. “This little gremlin,” She whispered playfully, pointing at the sleeping infant.

“Think I can change his diaper before I put him back in his Rock-and-Play?” He asked.

“Give it a shot. If he wakes back up, I can always put him back on the boob for a minute or two to soothe him,” She said with a small shrug as she hooked her tank top back on. She watched as he carefully settled Kaden on the small changing table, tilting her head a bit. “So, you wanna talk about what’s bothering you?”

“Nothing’s bothering me,” He said, but it was a bit too quick of a response. He carefully unpeeled the diaper and made a face, nose screwing up. “I still don’t understand how he can sleep through a diaper full of poop.”

“Little guy’s probably too tuckered out. I mean, he refused to sleep all day,” She pointed out. She leaned back to readjust her pillows a little bit before looking over at Keith again. He was just finishing up with wiping Kaden clean and had already pulled out the clean diaper for him. “Now how about you stop dodging and answer my question? You’ve been kinda huffy since we brought him home and I’d like to know why.” She insisted.

Kids had been something she and Keith had discussed often, especially once they got engaged, and agreed they both wanted. The idea of having a family to call his own had appealed to Keith and he’d been over the moon when Pidge told him she was pregnant. She’d noticed it in the first couple of days after they got home with Kaden, how Keith seemed to deflate with how much attention she had to give to their newborn. She didn’t want to think that he regretted their decision to have a family, but that was the simplist answer she could come up with, given the evidence at her disposal.

He looked at her in surprise before sighing. “It’s nothing, Pidge,”

“Don’t give me that bull. Look, if you weren’t ready to be a dad, you should have-!”

“What? No, that’s not it at all!” He argued quickly, his tone a bit too loud and frantic. They both tensed as a shrill cry came from the changing table and a set of little legs kicked in the air frantically. He turned back around, quickly getting on the fresh diaper and buttoning his onesie closed again. “I’m sorry, bud, I should have watched my volume.” He said, carefully scooping him back up and cradling him against his shoulder.

“Go ahead and bring him back to bed with you. I have an idea that I’d like to try,” She suggested.

Keith walked over and slipped under the covers, starting to offer the squirming and whining infant over to her. Instead, she shook her head and nudged him to lie down with a push to his shoulders. Once he was settled down, she carefully readjusted both her boys so that Kaden’s head rested against Keith’s chest, right above his heart, and Keith’s arm was snuggly wrapped around Kaden so he couldn’t squirm around too much. They watched as he slowly settled, his breathing leveling out to match his dad’s, and slowly his eyes closed again. She watched as violet eyes widened before shining in the low light of the bedside lamp, enamoured and awestruck. “He’s so beautiful,” He breathed softly.

She smiled and snuggled down in beside him. “”The sounds of a heartbeat can soothe a baby, since they were used to hearing the sound while in the womb. It doesn’t have to be the Mommy’s heartbeat, either,” She explained gently.

Keith tilted his head and pressed a small kiss to her head, waiting a moment before taking a deep breath. “I’m not trying to be huffy, it’s just… I don’t like leaving everything to you. I want to help out and be as involved with Kaden as possible, give you time to rest while also taking time to bond with him myself. I don’t want either of you to ever feel like I wasn’t there for you enough. I just… I’m afraid of being like Nyrus,” He confessed, sounding uneasy and uncomfortable.

That explanation actually made a lot more sense, when Pidge thought about it.

Nyrus was a high ranking special ops agent working with the Blade of Marmora and, as it turned out, was actually Keith’s birth mother. She and Keith had encountered one another by chance – being paired up on a mission involving a new type of quintessence they’d discovered – but as she reprimanded him after the mission, he’d thrown off his mask to yell back at her, she realized who he was. Initially, she refused to work with him further or explain herself to anyone. For a few months she avoided him completely before finally he cornered her for the truth, during a huge meeting with the Blade higher-ups and the Coalition and Team Voltron.

The confrontation had been a disaster, to say the least.

The two of them had gone very quickly from a shouting match to actual fisticuffs quickly, which wasn’t too terribly surprising. Keith’s temperament was something he seemed to inherit from Nyrus – being quick to insults and aggression and violence when she felt she was being attacked – and the two of them mixed about as well as ammonium chloride and chlorine gas. Questions were asked and given answers that left Keith filled with nothing but anger. “It was not an easy choice to make,” Nyrus had snarled at him, keeping him pinned beneath her by his throat while her tail thrashed violently behind her, “but I had to do what was best for the universe.”

Nyrus had been tracking the Blue Lion’s quintessence signature to assure the Blade could keep it safe from Zarkon, whom was still working to locate them all. While she had been stationed on Earth, she’d met Keith’s father, Ethan, and found herself charmed by him. He had never seemed put off by her lack of Earthling social graces – like so many others had been – and accepted her as she was. She confided in him, upon her pregnancy with Keith, about her actual heritage, due to the chance that Keith could be born with Galran features. He’d loved her regardless of that fact. But when Keith was still very young, she received word from a few other members of the Blade – long dead and their names  fuzzy in her mind – that her ship was being tracked by Zarkon. Her options were to either return to the Blade, or destroy both her ship and her self to protect Earth and Blue Lion.

She had decided to take the option that she felt allowed her to do the most good.

“You could have taken us  _with you_!” Keith had spat back, trying to pry her hand off of him.

Her ears had twitched and brow creased, leaning close to scrutinize him. “ _Why_ would I have done that? Your father had no training of proper combat or space travel. You were just a kit, too small to survive outside of our eyes.  _Neither_  of you could have served a purpose to the Blade that would have justified bringing you along,” Her tone had been bewildered by his question, as if that answer should have been completely obvious.

Pidge had seen how Keith shattered at her words and surged forward, using her bayard to forcefully hoist Nyrus off of him.

After that situation, Keith had taken a huge step back on how much work he did for the Blade, terrified of becoming an embodiment of their rationale to the same extent of his mother. He didn’t want to become so focused that he cared more for the mission objectives than his future family. It took another year before Nyrus and he encountered one another again, and things had gone… A bit more civilly. Nyrus reached out to him to apologize, explaining that it was never a matter of not loving him- she did, she insisted, loved him more than she’d loved anyone or any thing in the universe – but more a matter of what she thought was best. “Either option, you would have grown up without me. I thought that by going back to the Blade, I could at least keep you from being involved in this war. Evidently, however, that… Didn’t go as planned. I would like the chance to make amends, to be… Well, perhaps not a mother, but at least  _someone_  to you.”

And Keith, desperate to have connections with any potential family he had, had agreed. Nyrus held true to her word and worked at remaining calm and composed when they discussed certain topics. She’d been crushed when she learned of all the hardships that Keith had suffered, from his father’s young death to his being bounced from home to home, while also being proud of the things he’d accomplished. Pidge herself was still weary of Nyrus but she did her best to be civil, as she wanted to put in at least as much effort as the older female was. Nyrus had attended she and Keith’s wedding and was expected to take a small stop-in to Earth to meet her first grandson sometime soon.

Which certainly explained why Nyrus had been on Keith’s mind over the last couple of weeks.

“You know,” She said as she settled in beside him, resting her head on his shoulder and settling one arm across his stomach, “it would have to take  _a lot_  of effort on your part to be  _anything_  like Nyrus. It’s already clear that we – Kaden and I – mean more to you than anything, and I doubt you’d ever willingly leave us. And for as confrontational as you can get, I doubt you’d ever have it in you to pin Kaden down by his throat and shout at him.” The look of pure horror that he flashed at the mere inclination was enough to warrant a small chuckle from her as she nestled down with a small sigh. “And I know that me saying this doesn’t necessarily get rid of those fears in you, but I hope it at least helps a little. You’re already an amazing dad, and you’re an amazing husband, and Kaden’s going to grow up knowing how much you love him.”

“I guess it is a little silly of me to be afraid,” He mumbled, a mixture of love and gratitude softening his voice. His attention had swiveled back to the small form curled against his chest. “After all, if a situation like the one with Nyrus ever occurred with us, I don’t doubt you’d happily blow half the Blade of Marmora to Kingdom Come for even  _suggesting_  that I have more important matters than our family.”

“ _Half_ the Blade of Marmora?” She asked skeptically.

“You could certainly take them all out, but I think you’d want to make an example of them. And if you took down all of them, there would be no one to really learn from it,” He answered.

“Fair enough. Now shush your pretty little face and let’s get some sleep,” She mused, pressing a small kiss to his collarbone before closing her eyes. She felt his arm move to curl around her, pressing along her back and his hand resting on her hip, and she smiled.

Come Hell or high water, the Kogane’s were going to be inseparable.


	29. Free Day - Family

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> For Pidge, uniting her family has always been her main goal, regardless of status as a Paladin. This extends to more than just her family that is attached to her by blood.

She had been getting ready to leave for a doctor’s appointment when the video call started to chime.

The caller was lucky that Alison was late – like she  _always_  was – in coming to take her on her way. She had told the people at the assisted living company that she didn’t want Alison as one of her assistant’s many a time already. The girl was flighty and had always been so rude and callous to her, even when she had started out trying to be nice and accommodating to the girl. She grumbled as she shifted, grabbing her cane and shuffling over to where her computer sat. She tilted her head curiously at the icon before letting her lips twist down in a scowl. It was probably Ian again, having his latest piece of tail call her up to whine about needing money. As far as she was concerned, he could suffer with no money for a couple of days. How her son had turned out to be such a cold and callous man, she still didn’t understand.

None of her other boys would have treated her the way that he did, not a single one of her lost trio!

“Listen  _here_ , you  _ungrateful little leech_! This is the  _last time_  I will tell you-!” She started but then cut off abruptly at the face staring back at her. The startled young woman was far too young and too cute to be wasting her time on an ingrate like her Ian. “That you are certainly not my son.”

The young woman blinked then giggled lightly, adjusting the snoozing infant cradled in her arms. “Ah, no, I’m afraid not. I’m sorry if you were expecting a call. I can always call back at another time, if that would be better,” She offered.

“No, no! I’m so sorry. My son, he’s not supposed to call me… He only ever wants to scream at me in hopes of getting a handout,” She explained with a scoff.

“That’s really rude of him,” The young woman agreed with a small frown.

“It certainly is! Raised that boy better than that and somehow he gets to thinking he can treat me like this!” She huffed, crossing her arms over her chest.

The other nodded and then paused, tilting her head and examining the older woman curiously. “I hope you don’t mind me asking, but… Well, I want to make sure that I got the right information. Would you happen to be Genevieve Kogane?” She asked.

Genevieve blinked then chuckled lightly. “Oh, my word, I haven’t heard someone use my full name in so long! Mother must be rolling in her box up in the closet!” She laughed lightly. She then nodded her head, settling back down. Laughing too hard would causing a coughing fit and she wasn’t in the mood for one of those. “Yes, my dear, I am, but I’d prefer to be called Eve. That’s what all my friends call me. Well, the ones that I still tolerate, anyway.”

The young girl’s eyes brightened and she nodded. “Excellent! I was so worried that the database wasn’t going to be up to date and I wouldn’t be able to get through! I’ve been trying to track your information down a while and, let me say, the Garrison did not make locating you an easy task!” She explained excitedly. She shifted the angle of her camera, panning it out a bit to offer a better view of herself and her baby. “It’s a pleasure to finally get in touch with you, Eve. My name is Katie, but everyone calls me Pidge, and this is my daughter, Amber.”

The tiny bundle in her arms shifted, letting out a low keening sound, brows knitting together in sleepy thought. After a moment, her little face relaxed and she nuzzled down further into a pale orange blanket she was swaddled up in. Eve smiled, the ache that was omnipresent in her chest picking up for a moment, recalling a similar face from almost 25 years prior. “She’s beautiful, darling,” She crooned softly.

Pidge beamed at her. “I’m glad you think so. I’m sure she’ll be happy to know her great-grandmother thinks she’s a looker,” She mused.

Eve opened her mouth and then paused, her smile fading into a small frown. Her mind was sent reeling, as if she’d been cast out to sea in the midst of a wicked storm. “I… I beg your pardon?” She asked quietly.

The younger woman’s smile became a bit more timid now. “Well, she’s your great-granddaughter. You see, my husband is Keith Kogane, your grandson,” She said.

There was suddenly a knock before the front door of her apartment was opened. “Mrs. Kogane, it’s time to go!” Alison called from the door, leaning against the frame and tinkering around with something on her phone.

She growled and wheeled around. “Took you long enough to get here! Since you’ve decided to finally grace me with your presence, make yourself useful and get me a cup of tea then call the doctor! I’m going to need to reschedule!” She snapped angrily. Alison glared at her briefly but she merely glared harder. “I’ve been keeping a log of your attitude and punctuality,  _little miss_ , and I know you can clock in using that fancy phone of yours. Wonder how  _your bosses_  would like to know how much time you’re  _actually_  spending looking after me like you’re supposed to be.”

The young woman paled at that and hurried inside, leaving her shoes at the door before rushing off to the kitchen. Eve smirked in satisfaction and turned her attention back to the monitor. “Wow… Keith wasn’t kidding when he said that you don’t take any attitude,” Pidge laughed lightly.

“I have given the girl ample chances to sweeten up. I don’t start out combative, you see,” Eve chuckled lightly. She then looked back down at the small infant then back up at her mother. “Now, what was that you were saying about my Keith?”

It took about two hours for Pidge to unravel the abridged story to Eve, but by the time she was done the older woman seemed to have a decent grasp of what to expect. She continued talking as Eve nursed her tea and Amber, once she awoke, nursed from Pidge. She told her of far-away planets and dangerous missions and mysterious space ships that looked like animals; told her of all that they had faced in their many years away from Earth. She told her about Keith’s struggle with trust issues, his search for his mother, his resignation that all of his family on Earth were either dead or had forgotten him. “We’ll be returning to Earth in a few days, now that the war is over,” Pidge said finally. She carefully adjusted Amber against her shoulder and started gently patting her back to burp her. “Keith’s just finishing up a few final details involving peace treaties and alliances, and then we’ll be coming home. That got me to wondering about if he was right or wrong about having family still alive on Earth. I did some snooping and some hacking and… Well, here we are.”

Eve nodded, eyes wide as she took everything in. She had seen some big thing on the television a few days back, about some ceremony involving a space program or something, but she had changed the channel after that. Keith had wanted to be an astronaut and anything involving talk of space left the whole in her heart to ache all over again. She sipped at her long-cold tea in thought. “I always knew that Nyrus was an odd one. Certainly didn’t think it was because she was a literal alien,” She commented.

Pidge let out a sharp back of laughter. “I see where Keith gets his sense of humor from,” She mused, rubbing small circles into her daughter’s back. She was silent for a bit, waiting until the baby falls asleep, then carefully moves her to a nearby bassinette. “So, if you don’t mind me asking, why didn’t Keith stay with you after his father passed?”

“It’s a long and unhappy story,” Eve mumbled quietly. She stared down at the greenish tinted liquid in the mug clutched between her fingers. She then took another breath and lifted her head, steeling herself. “But I suppose I have the time to tell you, so long as you don’t mind listening to an old woman prattle on.”

“It would be my pleasure to talk with you, Eve,” Pidge said with a warm, sincere smile. Eve would have wept in delight if she weren’t biting the inside of her cheek; it had been so long since anyone let her talk about all the people she had loved and lost and still missed without barking at her.

So she told her everything there was to say.

She told her about how she lost her husband, Daisuke Kogane, when she was still very young on an on-job work accident, but forced herself to power through to support her three sons. She told her how two of her sons, Daisuke Junior and Ethan, Keith’s father, were stolen from her in a car accident one night. The two men had been planning to start up a business together and gone out that night to have dinner in celebration and to finalize some details. On their way home, though, a drunk driver had sped through a red light and hit them full on. They were both dead before the ambulance even arrived.

Keith had been staying with her that night, as he was prone to doing when his father had to work odd hours or extra shifts.

In Ethan’s will, initially made when he was still alive, he made it clear that he wanted his mother to have legal guardianship over Keith if anything should ever happen to him. She explained that a man who claimed to work for the Garrison came to her after the funeral, insisting that they would take Keith off her hands for her. She had been far from pleasant to the man, swearing him every which way to Sunday for even suggesting that she wouldn’t want her only grandchild with her. It was only one incident, she admitted, and hadn’t thought much else of them after that.

For two years, she took after the young man, trying her best to look after him. Keith, only six when his father passed, didn’t always know how to handle his grief. He became combative and rebellious and violent. She was constantly called at work due to him getting into fights and having to be placed in either detention or suspension. She didn’t mind, though. She would rather deal with his attitude than have her grandson left in the hands of someone else, someone whom might not give him the patience and care she knew he needed. And, she said, it wasn’t always bad. There were plenty of happy, calmer moments between them in the two years they had together.

But then it was discovered that Eve had a brain tumor.

Her cancer was in the earlier stages, so a surgery and treatment would be quite effective for her. Even still, she had been aware of the risk she was going to be taking in going under the knife to have her brain poked at. There was always the chance that she wouldn’t wake up from surgery, so she had sought out her only remaining son, Ian. Ian, she explained, had only recently started to make amends with his mother after years of substance abuse that started when he was a college freshmen and being otherwise kicked form the family for stealing and selling some items that had once belonged to his father. She explained to him that, if something did happen to her, she entrusted everything to him; specifically, she explained, so that he could take over looking after Keith.

Her surgery had gone well, but she slipped into a coma for a full two weeks.

In that time, Ian had struggled with taking care of Keith. Terrified at losing the only other constant he had in his life, Keith had, rather than lash out, closed himself off. He spent as much time as he could by Eve’s bedside and barely ate. Ian became frustrated over how Keith was behaving and had shouted at the young boy multiple times, earning him strict looks from the hospital staff and, even on one occasion, being thrown out by the hospital security and threatened with a ban. It was at this point that he found out about the Galaxy Garrison’s proposal so long ago and got in contact with one of the higher ups there. Mere moments after Eve woke up, Keith tucked into her arms as she tried to gently soothe his sobs, he had been torn from her by two recruiters for the Galaxy Garrison. She had screamed after him, vowing that she would get him back no matter what.

She tried for years, racking up thousands of dollars in attorney fees, to get him back. Her anger and betrayal over Ian’s actions had led to her removing him from her will completely, realizing that was the reason he’d wanted his own nephew gone; so that he could have all the gain as well as be free the responsibility of raising a temperamental child. By the time the courts ruled that her guardianship rights had been terminated unlawfully, though, Keith was already over the age of eighteen. They informed her that all the information would be on public record, and that he could seek her out if he decided that was something he was interested in doing.

“It’s been almost a decade, so I figured he just didn’t want to see me,” She explained at the end, her eyes fixated on the bottom corner of the screen. Alison was settled in at the coffee table, watching her with wide eyes, having become enraptured by the story as Eve spoke. “I certainly never expected he hadn’t looked me up because he was busy fighting space-cat-Hitler.”

Pidge hummed softly. “And I doubt that he had a way to check the public records after he got booted from the Garrison, assuming the Garrison would have even let him access that information back when he was attending. His set-up in the desert was about as primitive as you could get nowadays,” She agreed. But then, she smiled softly at the older woman. “But you can tell him everything now. I’ll get in contact with my family and they can bring you by the ceremony.”

“And… You’re sure that he would want that? To see me again?” She asked uneasily.

“I’m sure. He doesn’t talk a lot about his family, but the stories that he has shared about you are always happy, and he smiles a little more when he tells them. I have no doubt in my mind that, even if he doesn’t know what you’ve been through, he’d want to see you again,” She insisted gently.

Eve took a deep breath and then nodded. “Well then, I’ll finally get to keep my promise, huh?”

………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..

When the day finally arrived, Eve felt like she was going to be sick.

She had gotten up early so that she could straighten her unruly greying brown curls and then tie it back into ponytail. She applied just a little bit of make-up to try and hide the dark bags and crow’s feet around her eyes. She picked out her best satin blouse with a pair of black slacks and some black sneakers, wanting to go with clothes that would be nice but also comfortable. Standing and walking for long periods of time tended to wear her out, given that she was 68 years old, but she wasn’t going to miss this. Even if her legs felt like lead, she was going to walk out there and stand there and see him again. Her heart raced and she had to swallow a lump in her throat to keep back tears.

She quickly moved her things from her purse to the large tote bag she’d picked out for the day, a brand new photo album tucked inside. She’d gone through all the old pictures she’d kept over the years and put the ones she thought looked the best together in a large, heavy compilation to give Keith. There were pictures of she and Daisuke, Ethan and his brothers, Keith with all of them at various points. She included almost all of his baby pictures, unable to resist. There was still a lingering fear of being rejected and turned away, and she had very little to offer to him. She’d spent a good chunk of her money in paying attorney fees and other bills.

She didn’t have a lot more than her memories. Thankfully, she’d always been a bit of a shutterbug, so she had small snippets of those in a tangible form.

She had given Pidge her actual phone number and address before they ended the video chat, and been called by Colleen Holt, Pidge’s mother, so the two of them could coordinate. The other woman was pleasant and warm, eager to get to know her. She explained that Samuel, her husband, would already be at the site to help finish the preparations for the event. Eve headed out and waited by the leasing office of her apartment complex, startled when she saw the Holt’s car – a blue Malibu – parked in a spot. “I hope you don’t mine,” Colleen explained, “but I didn’t want you to have to wait too long, so I got here a little early.”

“Hopefully you weren’t waiting too long,” Eve said as she slipped in, setting her cane beside her leg.

On the ride, they chatted about Pidge, or Katie as Colleen tended to call her, which had Eve thrilled. She was curious about what more to expect from her granddaughter-in-law. She learned that she had single-handedly infiltrated the Galaxy Garrison after they fabricated the disappearance of her father and older brother, Matthew, on a mission to one of Pluto’s moons. She was an adept hacker and had even learned how to speak several alien languages. She could rebuild any piece of tech she encountered in such a way that it would run twice as efficiently. She was intelligent, yes, but she had a quick temper and could be incredibly stubborn.

Eve was glad for this; if Keith was still as stubborn as she recalled, he’d need someone that could go toe-to-toe with him.

The whole event was crowded, packed with other people in the large open field. Seated behind the stage were five large Lion robots – Voltron, she recalled from what she’d been told – as well as a large ship that reminded her of a castle from a storybook. On the stage, she could see seven figures in a small cluster around a few Garrison officials. They all chat for a bit before one of the Garrison official’s steps up to the podium. She tuned out through most of the whole thing, speeches and press releases and other nonsense that fills up two hours. There were no chairs but she powered through the whole thing, standing with her cane dug hard into the ground, but the whole time she just watched him.

There was no trace of the baby fat she had loved to pinch and poke on his face any longer, having formed out to the same broad chin and pronounced cheekbones common in the Kogane family lineage. There were bags under his eyes, but a small smile as he leaned closer to Pidge and reached out to Amber, settled in her lap, and gently waggled his fingers at her as the Garrison representative introduced him. He strode up to the podium with a gait that spoke of confidence and control, shoulders squared and head tilted up high. When he spoke, his voice was a rich and deep baritone; not a single sign of the high-pitched barks she remembered of him, or the crackling squawks she’d anticipated during his teen years.

She could see so much of Ethan in him that it was simultaneously painful and comforting.

Finally, after far too long, they were excused from the stage. Once of the other men, sporting a huge grin as he watched the crowd, suddenly turned and held another infant out towards the crowd, showing off the silver-haired tot. The third male on the team suddenly cupped his hands around his mouth and began loudly singing the song from the opening of the Lion King. The silver haired woman that Eve was certain mothered the child looked affectionately exhausted and she could hear loud, passionate chanting from somewhere in the crowd; the Paladin’s family, if she reasoned a guess. Keith leaned back and muttered something to Pidge, looking exasperated, and she only laughed and gently nudged him along.

“You ready?” Colleen asked quietly, offering her arm to the older woman.

Eve took it and nodded, a small smile turning up on her lips. She looked around as they made their way to an area that was blocked off by security, watching the throngs of people as they dispersed this way and that. Some of them tried to shove past the security guards, but were pushed back unless given the go-ahead by a younger man whom bore a striking resemblance to Pidge. When they approached, he gave Colleen a quick kiss to the cheek and introduced himself as Matthew Holt, Pidge’s older brother and a member of the space rebellion. “Welcome to the family, Eve,” He said warmly before helping she and Colleen slide past.

The words sent a fluttering of giddiness to whirl through her.

They walked past the other reunions occurring, picking up pieces of this and that conversation. To their right she caught a humorous one. “So you went and married a hot alien princess, and then had a royal heir with her and didn’t think to tell your dear mama?”

“Well… I mean, if it makes you feel better we haven’t  _actually_  gotten married yet-!”

“ _Excuse me_ , young man!”

“ _Lance_ , you  _slut_!”

To their left, she heard another that was more on the emotional spectrum. “I missed you all  _so much_!”

“I  _knew_  you had to be alive! I knew my little Hunkie was too smart to be gone!”

“ _Oh, Mom_!” And then the Paladin fell into blubbering, throwing his large arms around both his mothers and pulling them close. Eve smiled gently at the scene before looking ahead, at the small group that she was being led towards.

An older man that she assumed to be Samuel Holt stood with them, holding Amber Rose up in the air just above his head and cooing at her energetically. Amber was squealing in delight. Pidge and Keith were watching and laughing.

Panic gripped her tight just a few steps away, her legs refusing to move further. Colleen paused and looked at her worriedly. Eve opened her mouth to try and say she was fine, that she just needed a minute to collect herself.

Instead, what came out was a loud, ugly sob of a cry. And suddenly, all eyes were on her.

Keith stared, his brow furrowed for a moment, but then it clicked for him. His eyes widened and he breathed in harsh through his teeth. His lips parted a bit, licking them quickly, and then stared for another full moment. Eve wondered, briefly, with how erratic her heart was beating if she was about to have a heart attack. “Nana?” He asked after a moment.

She wanted to speak her answer but instead she only managed a nod before she was completely lost to her tears. Her whole body shook with her tears and, if not for Colleen still stationed beside her, she was sure she’d have lost balance and toppled over. She managed to open her eyes again briefly when she felt arm wrap around her, warn and secure and reassuring, before she let her cane drop and threw her arms around him, squeezing for all she was worth. She choked out as many “I love you”s and “I’ve missed you so much” and “I’m so sorry”s as she could manage once she had the fortitude to do so.

He didn’t say anything for a long time, just held her tight and sobbed, too. She could tell by how his chest shook and his breath caught. In that moment she felt more alive than she had in years; the hollowed, broken places inside of her filling up just a bit. She had resigned herself to never seeing him again, to never knowing what kind of man he had grown up to become. She had accepted she would most likely die alone and only be found thanks to some kind of medical staff, that she would have no guests left at her funeral.

She had accepted that she would die and Keith would never know that she never stopped loving him or missing him or thinking of him.

“Oh,  _Nana_ ,” He said, taking a shuddering breath and leaning back. She lifted her head and offered him a watery smile.

“I thought I’d never see you again,” She said, hiccupping a bit at the end.

“I thought you were already gone,” He admitted. Which, admittedly, made sense. Last time he had seen her, she’d been in the hospital recovering from a cancer diagnosis.

“Couldn’t do that, baby. I made a promise to you, after all,” She sniffled, reaching up to gently cup either side of his face. She swallowed hard to keep her next bout of tears at bay for a little while longer. “You’ve grown up  _so much_ , Keith, and done  _so much good_. Your father would be  _so proud_.  _I’m so proud_  of all you’ve done.”

He smiled and sniffled, letting her wipe away a few more tears with her thumb for him. “How did you know I’d be here?”

She indicated her head behind him as Pidge slowly approached, pausing briefly to pick up Eve’s cane for her. “I remembered you mentioned her before, so I figured that since we were coming back to Earth, why not do some research? After all, I wanted to be sure there really weren’t any other Kogane’s left running around… So I went ahead and did some research while you were off on that diplomacy meeting with the new council the Galra enacted to govern them. I found your birth certificate and used the information I was able to get from that to find your dad’s birth certificate, and that was how I got Eve’s information. Well, I had to do a little bit more digging to locate her marriage license and track her from there,” Pidge explained with a little smile.

Eve laughed. “Well, I’m afraid that must have been a bit bothersome. I was pretty young when I had my first son and it took a few years for Daisuke and I to get married,” She said.

“Not really,” She giggled back. She then grinned up at Keith. “And, before you ask why… We’re married now. That means our families become one, which makes Eve family, too. And you know how I feel about having members of my family in places I can’t easily reach them.”

“I’m glad you kept this one, darling; I like her already,” Eve chimed with a warm smile.

Keith laughed and nodded. “I’m lucky to have her. But, come on, Nana, I want to introduce you to the rest of the family,” He said, letting her hold on to his arm as he helped her walk the remaining small distance.

“Good. I want as much time as I can get with all of you,” She said happily, giving his arm a small squeeze, and then turning to flash her smile to Pidge.

God, she’d missed having a real family to call hers.


	30. Conspiracy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Canon divergent. Katie Holt is far too intelligent to buy into the pretty lies the Garrison sings. They are hiding the truth to cover up their own incompetence. No one will listen to her. Or, rather, that is what she believes until she recalls a certain someone she had befriended.

She was snarling as she paced in front of the Garrison, the security guards glaring her down. “You think you can  _pull this shit_? Think you can  _lie_  about what’s  _happening?_ ” She shouted, her fists clenched at her sides. She pulled her –  _Matt’s_  – keys from to her pocket and pointed them at the guards. “I will make you all regret what you’ve done! I will find a way to prove all the lies you’ve told! And I won’t stop until I do!” She had gotten what she was looking for when she had broken in this time, but she didn’t need them realizing that. Well, that and the fact that she would take any chance she could to scream at them about what they’d done.

“Keep moving along, Holt, otherwise we’ll have to call the cops and officially slap you with a trespassing charge,” One of the guards said with an annoyed sigh.

She glared then stormed off to her Jeep, parked off to the side. She sat behind the wheel, punched the dashboard twice, and then slumped back against her seat. She took a deep breath and pressed the heel of her hands into her eyes. She had spent one year in cadet training at the Garrison before, with next to no notice, she was informed that she was being booted from the program. She’d been devastated by the news and holed herself up in her room for several days, mulling over every assignment and interactions she’d had with everyone there in the last year. She’d reached out to Keith, whom she’d continued to keep in touch with even though they were assigned to different teams, but even he hadn’t been able to get any answers.

And then, a week after her return home, the news broadcast about the Kerberos mission hit.

There’d been no stop by their home beforehand. She heard her mother’s sob from her room and came rushing down the stairs. She clutched at the banister as she read the report over and over. She had then stormed back upstairs, got herself put together, and then rushed off to find her gear. She had made her first attempt to get in, knowing immediately this was why she’d been kicked out. They’d known she wouldn’t believe their cockamamie story, so they’d tried to toss her out to avoid her snooping.

That, however, hadn’t stopped her.

She continued to break in and had gotten a bit of information each time. Initially, Keith had been her assistant through every break-in. He was quick and quiet and sneaky like some kind of ninja, even in the bright goldenrod Garrison blazers. But, after a few weeks, something had happened and he got booted. She looked into it herself, desperate to see if there was any other way to get in contact with him. The record only said “Severe disciplinary issues”, with no further explanation as to what that meant. She had tried to call his phone but it had been disconnected. Then again, she thought as she turned the car back on, just because the phone didn’t have service didn’t mean it couldn’t offer her a helping hand.

She reached over and took out her laptop from under the passenger side seat.

It took her a bit of time, but she managed to track down the GPS signal from it. She stopped by a convenience store nearby to fill the tank and grab a couple snacks before heading out. The signal seemed to be somewhere out in the middle of the desert, which had left her a bit cautious but more so curious. She figured he couldn’t be dead as the signal she picked up wasn’t an old one; the phone itself was still powered on. That meant that he was still alive or that, at least, whoever took him out had taken his phone with them for whatever reason.

Incidents such as what she was potentially walking in to were why she kept a Taser gun on hand.

It was quite the drive but when she reached her destination, she could see there was a small shack. It looked to be in less-than-livable, but it was still standing. That, she supposed, was something at least. She parked the car along the side of the shack, facing away from the path she’d followed to get there. She quickly put her laptop back in its case, hefted it over her shoulder, and got out of the car.

She made sure to take slow and cautious steps, creeping her way towards a nearby window. There were the tattered remnants of a curtain in front, with small holes that she could peek through. I brief glance inside revealed nothing but a dimly lit room with some things pinned to the wall and a beat-up old couch. She could also see a slim hallway off to the side that may have led to a bedroom and bathroom, but she couldn’t say for certain. She then moved away from the window and made her way up to the door.

As she moved to knock, it was thrown open and a figure launched at her.

They tussled for a brief stint, rolling until she was pinned beneath them with a knife to her throat, but she fished out her Taser gun. She pressed it against her attacker’s chest and glared up only to find her gaze locked with familiar violet eyes. She blinked twice, slowly, then chuckled a bit. “Hello there, Katie. Looks like you came expecting trouble… Guess my knife is a little outclassed against your gun, huh?” Keith said with a small huff, his eyes softening as he realized who she was.

“If it makes you feel any better, it’s just a Taser,” She offered as he carefully moved his knife away and sat up.

“Oh, well then I still have a chance,” He said as he pushed himself upright. He shoved his knife back on his belt with one hand while offering the other to help her.

She took it then threw herself into him, hugging him tightly. “It’s so good to see you,” She mumbled against her shoulder, some of the tension she’d been carrying for the last couple of weeks drain out of her at seeing her closest friend. This was the same guy that she’d snuck on to the Garrison roof with to exchange coded messages with Matt and Shiro while they were away. This was the same guy that had helped her sneak a remote control tarantula into Commander Sampson’s desk on April Fool’s Day. This was the same guy that would swap her veggies – excluding when they had peas or okra - for his pudding cups and brownies because she hated broccoli and carrots and corn. This was the same guy that had yelled at Iverson when she was escorted off the grounds upon her initial boot from the Garrison, and helped her sneak back on to do some digging on the truth behind Kerberos.

He carefully looped both of his arms around her and gave a small squeeze. “Same to you. I’ve been wondering how you’ve been doing,” He mumbled quietly.

“Apparently about as well as you. What did you do to get booted out of the Garrison for?” She asked as she slowly pulled back.

“I decked Iverson in the face. He was going on some rant because some other group crashed the simulator, barking about how ‘These kinds of rookie mistakes are what causes things like the Kerberos mission!’ and other nonsense like that,” He scoffed, carefully stepping back and opening the front door. He propped it open with one foot so he could cross his arms over his chest. “I had to call him out on it. Your dad, Matt, Shiro… They were all too smart and skilled to be taken out by some minor mistake. They would know better for sure. He kept arguing with me about and talking so much shit… So finally I decked him to shut him up.”

“That certainly explains why he never seems to open that one eye anymore!” She laughed as she slipped past him to get inside. He followed after her and hurried over to the couch, moving some papers and a notebook. He then indicated the seat with a smug, satisfied smirk on his lips.

“Glad to know that I left such an impression,” He said before heading over to the small kitchen off to the side. He pulled out two glasses, reaching into the slim and small fridge, and poured two glasses of water.

“You’re lucky I was anticipating that I might get jumped, you know,” Pidge chimed as she settled into the cleared spot. She then unzipped her case and fished the laptop out, settling it on her lap and starting to pull up the information she’d ported over from the Garrison database. “I made sure to bring my heavy duty case. If I hadn’t, this poor thing would have gotten all kinds of jacked up.” She glanced up to stare at the maps he’d pinned to his wall. There were strings and lines and colored pins all over the places, attaching location to location.

It reminded her of police stations in movies and shows where there was a serial killer on the loose. Or like the kinds of

“You could have fixed it with a paperclip and a straw,” He scoffed as he walked over, offering her one of the glasses. He took a sip as she did then peered over her shoulder at what she was pulling up. “Looks like you’ve been keeping up with what the Garrison is getting up to.”

“And it looks like you’ve found an interesting little project of your own,” She mused, indicating his wall.

He nodded before looking back over at her. “You show me yours, I show you mine?” He offered.

She flashed him a small smirk and nodded. “Oh, you’re going to  _love_  what I’ve brought for show-and-tell,”


	31. Endgame

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “The little child scowled then sat up a bit more, swiping at them with her hands. “Roar! I am a dragon!” She bellowed, sitting up a bit more on her knees and trying to seem as imposing as possible.”

The cadets were all thrilled about the presentation that day. It wasn’t every day that space travelers as versed and intelligent as Team Voltron, Garrison trainees Once-Upon-a-Time, came by to talk about their encounters and how they made it through. Felix smirked as he stretched, Max and Travis just a few steps behind him. “Well, my chums, today is the day,” He mused lightly.

Max rolled their eyes a bit. “You’re going to stop making poor Arabella humor you and your dumb conversations?”

He scowled at her. “I am  _not_  bothering her! If I was, she would have told me to hit the bricks, just like she did with Colton!” He snapped back. Arabella was another one of the fighter class pilots in their class, though she belonged to a different group. She was smart, skilled and all around the type of person people gravitated towards.

“He has a point. Arabella  _really_  doesn’t like being bothered by people she doesn’t like, so she must not dislike Felix’s flirting all  _that_  much!” Travis agreed with a bright smile.

Felix glared at him then huffed. “Gee, thanks, buddy,” He scoffed sarcastically.

Travis, not seeming to pick up on what he was actually saying, smiled wider and flashed a thumbs up. “Any time, dude!” He said.

“Any way,” Felix said with a flippant wave of a hand, “I’ll be right back. Time to enact my plan.” He then shifted past them and headed through the throngs of other students, looking around to try and spot Arabella. His grin widened as he spotted her standing with the other two members of her assigned team, her back to him but he recognized the lavender ribbon she always tied her hair back with. He started to walk over, raising his hand and opening his mouth to shout for her attention, but was stopped when one of his teachers stepped in front of him.

“Cadet Gonzalez, you should be heading to your seat,” The older male said, arms calmly folded behind his back and a no-nonsense scowl on his features.

Felix let out a nervous chuckle. “Oh, Commander Kogane! I was just going to speak with Arabella, ask about some notes I missed during class yesterday. Maybe sit with her so that we can discuss in more detail some things I was struggling with,” He said quickly.

“Today’s event is more than just a simple demonstration or professional question and answer event. This is a huge opportunity for you cadets to learn from pilots that have experienced things that the Garrison can never truly prepare you for. You all have assigned seats next to your group mates and your student ID numbers are listed on your respective seats. Now, I suggest you go find Cadet Hardy and Cadet Wilkinson and get settled into your seats. The presentation will begin shortly,” He said, tone carrying a weight of finality, and then turned and headed over to start corralling the other students towards their seats.

While a small huff, Felix headed back over to join Travis and Max, whom had already located their seats. “Ugh, why does Commander Kogane have to be such an  _ass_?” He groaned.

“Aw, poor baby! Did the Commander cock-block you?” Max snickered lightly.

“He was probably the one that decided we’d have assigned seats! It seems like something he would do, just to try and keep us all in line! Maybe if he pulled that stick out of his ass, he’d be better liked by the other students!” He grumbled angrily, crossing his arms and sinking further into his seat. He perked up a bit when he felt eyes on him, glancing up briefly to see a pair of large hazel eyes watching him. The eyes belonged to a figure far too small to belong to another student, a large hood tugged up over and drooping partially over their forehead. The hooded coat she was wearing was a light grey hue and had tons of bright red spikes going down it.

“What are you looking at, kid?” Max huffed out in annoyance.

The little child scowled then sat up a bit more, swiping at them with her hands. “Roar! I am a dragon!” She bellowed, sitting up a bit more on her knees and trying to seem as imposing as possible.

Felix smiled, his arms unfurling, and crooned, “You’re an awfully cute dragon!”

“Don’t humor it!” Max barked while Travis chuckled lightly at the exchange

“Amber, sweetie, turn back around, please,” The all-familiar voice of Arabella chimed lightly as she approached, a baby with dark brown hair bundled up in a pink and white checkered blanket cradled in one arm and another child holding her other hand. The younger child was sleeping, little head slumped against her shoulder, a little line of drool starting to creep down from the corner of their mouth. The other one seemed to be about the same age as the dragon girl, but he was a bit strange. He had curly silver hair and bright blue eyes and bronze colored skin, which he found strange since most cases of albinism he’d heard about were pale skin and red eyes.

“I’m a good dragon growling at the bad guy!” Amber declared as she turned back around to face Arabella.

The older girl chuckled lightly. “Is that so?” She asked, turning a bit to get a look at who she was talking about. She blinked in surprise. “Oh, hey, Felix, Max, Travis! How are you guys doing?” She asked happily as she settled into her seat. Once she was seated, Amber crawled into her lap and reached over, carefully wiping at the other baby’s mouth with the sleeve of her jacket. The other child crawled into the seat next to Arabella’s and then started tugging on the back of Amber’s hood, trying to either dislodge her or get her attention.

Felix’s eyes widened a bit before he flashed a smile, glad that she would still be close enough that he could maybe talk to her. “Doing good, looking forward to the presentation. I take it you’re in charge of the junior division for this whole shebang?” He asked playfully.

“Well, see, I do babysitting when I go home for my Uncle and some friends of his. They’re helping out with everything today, and it isn’t really safe for all the kids to be just wandering around back there, so I got permission to have them come sit with me so I can watch them,” She explained.

“Let go of my hood, dumb-face!” Amber suddenly squawked, reaching back and swatting at the other young child.

“Move! She’s my cousin so I get to sit in her lap, stupid-head!” The other child snapped back, tugging harder at the hood.

“Alfor, Amber, calm down! No need to fight! I can, uh, let’s see,” She rambled, trying to figure out how to go about keeping both children happy.

“I could take one of them,” Felix offered quickly, shifting to stand upright.

Arabella blinked in surprise then hummed. “Are you sure? They can be a little unruly,” She said worriedly.

“I’m great with kids!” He insisted happily.

“Says the guy that was just telling us to ignore the kid less than five minutes ago?” Max mumbled with a snort.

Felix sent them a quick glare before turning his bright demeanor back on to face Arabella. “I promise I’ll keep a good eye on the kid, make sure they’re happy and settled throughout the whole presentation! And it’s not like you won’t be nearby if I have any trouble!” He said.

With a quick glance down at the still squabbling children she nodded. “Okay, I trust you. Amber, you’re going to sit with my friend, Felix, okay? You’ll be right behind us if you need me, okay?” She said gently.

A look of betrayal crossed young Amber’s face before Felix scooped her up and brought her back with he and his group. “Aw, it’s okay, little girl! Just like Arabella said, she’ll be right there if you need her!” He pointed out.

She blinked then scowled, something that seemed eerily familiar to Felix, and turned away to send her sulk towards the grass. A moment later, Commander Kogane took the stage and introduce himself as the Black Paladin of Voltron, leader of the team, and now an instructor at the Garrison. As he began to explain the occurrences that had led him down that road, the younger recruit could only stare in surprise. Who Commander Kogane had been wasn’t something that was ever addressed in class. He made vague comments about his having a great amount of experience with space travel and battling in a ship, but this blew his mind a little bit. Perhaps there was more to the older man’s strictness than he’d been willing to give credit.

And then there was a little tug on Felix’s arm, causing him to glance down. Amber was pouting even worse than before but pointed to the seat ahead of them. “I can’t see anything because stupid Alfor is standing up,” She grumbled.

A glance forward showed her to be telling the truth, the young boy standing up on Arabella’s thigh so he could see better. “That’s a little rude of him, huh? Well, I have an idea,” Felix said with a small grin before hoisting Amber up and settling her on his shoulders. She squeaked a bit in surprise then giggled lightly, setting her little hands on his head to help steady herself.

“Oh, come on! Are you seriously gonna block my view?” One of the students sitting behind him groaned out.

Felix turned around to face them and glared. “Oh shut up, Franklin! You’re just playing Candy Crush on your phone, why the Hell do you care?” He snapped back.

Franklin tensed then scowled. “I… I learn better when I multitask,”

“Unless you can have one eye on your game and one eye on the stage, you’ll learn just fine, you big baby,” He scoffed back.

“You’re not a-posed to have your phone out right now!” Amber chimed in loudly, pointing at the screen still displaying the colorful game.

“She does have a point! Now, how about I stay quiet about this and you stop lying about having an issue? Sound like a plan, pal?” He suggested.

Franklin grumbled something back before returning his attention to his game.

Felix turned back around and focused again as the Red Paladin prepared to take the stage. Each Paladin had interesting stories to tell about how they grew as people through all they’d experienced. It was strange to hear that, a long time ago, Commander Kogane had been the Red Paladin but then taken the role of leader when the original Black Paladin had been forced to step down. It was reassuring to hear the Red Paladin, Lance McClain, speak about how he started out as a low-class pilot when he entered the Garrison but soon gained the confidence and skill of a veteran through hard work and determination. It had been enthralling to hear the Blue Paladin, Allura of Altea, speak about the history behind the Lions creation by her people so many years ago. It was heartwarming to hear the Green Paladin, Pidge Gunderson, speak about her struggles to unite with the family she’d lost to the Galra and later dedicate herself to doing the same for so many of the alien planets they liberated. It was inspiring to hear the Yellow Paladin, Hunk Garrett, speak about how amazing it had been to help liberate planets and that, to him, some of their most rewarding missions were supply deliveries or construction projects for planets that were still shaky after years of oppression under the Galra Empire.

They all talked about how, despite all they’d been through, they wouldn’t change any of it, because otherwise they might not have the happy endings they did now.

The lecture turned out to be a full three hours but it didn’t feel that long. Throughout the whole thing, Felix and Amber would occasionally whisper to each other in awe and delight over what they were learning. Amber seemed to like the Commander Kogane and Pidge Gunderson’s stories the best, with how she’d lean as far forward as she could to hear better, Felix having to tighten his grip on her little calves to keep her from completely tumbling over and getting a firsthand experience with crashing.

Once it was over, Felix got up with Amber still on his shoulders, taking wide steps and making loud “Kaboom!” noises with each step while she preened and cried out an equally loud “Roar!” with each step. “Wow, he wasn’t kidding about being good with kids,” Max commented in surprise.

Travis chuckled lightly. “Well, he might fudge the truth a little from time to time, but he’s never outright lied,” He pointed out.

Arabella smiled as she caught up with Felix, gently rocking the now awake baby in her arm while Alfor followed along, his little hand clutching hers happily. “I’m impressed! She warmed up to you really quick!” She giggled lightly.

Felix perked up and smiled a bit more shyly. “Well, it’s not hard to get along with a cool kid. I mean, just look at her! She’s a little dragon! How sleek is that?” He laughed.

“Interesting explanation, Cadet Gonzalez,” Commander Kogane said calmly from behind him, causing the younger man to jump and yelp.

“Daddy! I saw you, I saw you up there!” Amber suddenly gushed, reaching out towards him.

Felix watched as Commander Kogane shifted his attention up to the bright-eyed little girl and the man’s expression seemed to melt into something soft and affectionate. “I saw you, too. You were having a lot of fun listening to me and Mommy, weren’t you?” He mused, stepping a bit closer and reaching out for her.

Felix shifted to help, ducking his head and lifting the little girl up a bit more, and watched her immediately throw her arms around her Dad’s neck. “Yup! I didn’t really understand a lot of what you said but it was still cool!” She said happily.

Commander Kogane laughed –  _actually_  laughed, like from his chest! Felix didn’t even know he was  _capable_  of doing that! – and pushed the hood of her coat back so he could press a kiss to her forehead, revealing a braid of inky colored locks. “Well, I’m glad you had fun, regardless!” He said. Smile still in place he turned to look at Felix and Arabella. “I take it she and Alfor were butting heads again?”

“They were being a little confrontation,” Arabella agreed, nodding her head in Felix’s direction, “but Felix was nice enough to offer to help me out. And it seemed like he and Amber got along really well, too.”

Commander Kogane hummed and nodded at Felix. “Thank you for looking after her. I really do appreciate it, Felix,” He said evenly.

Felix flushed a bit, flattered by the sincere gratitude in his superior’s voice and the fact he actually called him by his first name. “It was a pleasure. She’s a really fun kid,” He said happily.

The other nodded before turning to head over and join the other Paladins again. “Now, Amber dear, we’ve told you not to go getting into arguments. You’re going have a little brother or sister soon. Wouldn’t you like to get along with them?”

“Well, I’ll obviously get along with them, Daddy! They’ll be smart and cool, unlike certain booger-breaths!” She answered, being polite at first but then leaning back over her Dad’s shoulder to shout the last part at the boy in question.

Alfor opened his mouth to snap back but closed his mouth when Arabella calmly cleared her throat. “Anyway, thank you so much for your help, Felix,” She said, smiling brightly at him.

“It was my pleasure,” He agreed quickly.

She nodded a bit, looking down at Alfor and then back up. “W-Well, um… When we go on Spring Break in a couple weeks… I agreed to watch the kids while their parent’s go to some coalition gala or something… I know it’s not really a real date or anything, but we could order some pizza and watch some movies or-!” She started to ramble.

“I’d actually really love that. It’d be my pleasure,” He said sincerely.

Her eyes lit up brightly. “Great! I’ll talk with you later to swap cell numbers and stuff,” She said before Alfor let out a long drawn-out whine. She huffed at him then flashed him an apologetic smile. “Let me get them back to Uncle Lance and Aunt Allura. I’ll get back to you before classes are over today, promise!” She called before taking Alfor’s hand and heading over to the Paladins.

Felix took a deep breath then let it out in a happy whistle, looking back at the stunned Max standing a bit behind him. “And you said that Arabella was only talking to me to be nice,” He sneered.


End file.
